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Series XXIII V -, Nos. 1-2 

JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY STUDIES 

IN 

Historical and Political Science 

(Edited by H. B. Adams, 1882-1 901) 
J. M. VINCENT 

J. H. HOLLANDER W. W. WILLOUGHBY 

Editors 



^^^ THE 

EARLY PERIOD OF RECONSTRUCTION 
IN SOUTH CAROLINA 



BY 

JOHN PORTER HOLLIS, Ph.D. 

Acting Professor of History and Economics in Southwestern University, 

Texas 



BALTIMORE 
THE JOHNS HOPKINS PRESS 

PUBLISHED MONTHLY 

January-February, 1905 



JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY STUDIES 

IN 

Historical and Political Science 

Edited by HERBERT B. ADAMS, 1882-1901 



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1 ia 



THE EARLY PERIOD OF RECONSTRUCTION 
IN SOUTH CAROLINA 



ii 



Series XXIII Nos. 1-2 

JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY STUDIES 

IN 

Historical and Political Science 

(Edited by H. B. Adams, 1882-1 901) 

J. M. VINCENT 
J. H. HOLLANDER W. W. WILLOUGHBY 

Editors 



THE 

EARLY PERIOD OF RECONSTRUCTION 
IN SOUTH CAROLINA 



BY 



JOHN PORTER HOLLIS, Ph.D. 

Acting Professor of History and Economics in Southwestern University, 

Texas 



BALTIMORE 
THE JOHNS HOPKINS PRESS 

PUBLISHED MONTHLY 

January-February, 1905 



f 



>^^ 



V 



x^^ 



LIBRARY of OONaacSS 
fwu Copies iteceivBU 

FEB 11 iy05 

Oopyriji'it s-'iify _ 
tiUSS OL. XXc Noi 
COPY B. 



Copyright, 1905, by 

THE JOHNS HOPKINS PRESS 



Zi)i £orb (^aftiittor« (preee 

THE FRIKDENWALD COMPANY 
BALTIMORE, MU. 



CONTENTS 

CHAPTER PAGE 

I. Introduction 9 

II. Presidential Reconstruction 31 

III. Congressional Intervention 52 

IV. The Beginnings of the " Carpet-rag Regime" 83 

V. The Freedmen's Bureau 107 



PREFACE 

Perhaps no part of the history of South CaroHna is looked 
upon by the people of the State as of greater significance 
than the era of reconstruction. The interest which attaches 
to the period and the oft-expressed desire that its events be 
adequately treated with strictly historical method, led the 
writer to undertake this monograph. What is here offered 
is an installment of a projected history, already in prepara- 
tion, of the entire reconstruction movement in South 
Carolina. 

The purpose of this monograph is to show by a simple 
narration of the facts: 

1. The direct effect of the Civil War upon South Carolina 
economically and in political sentiment, and the spirit in 
which the white people of the State accepted the first at- 
tempts at reconstruction. 

2. The chief features of the constitution of 1865, the polit- 
ical sentiment displayed in the convention, and the legislation 
immediately following. 

3. The causes which led to the failure of the reconstruc- 
tion government under the constitution of 1865, and the sub- 
stitution therefor of a different plan of reconstruction, based 
on acts of Congress. 

4. The political and military activity during the second 
provisional government, the method of electing the consti- 
tutional convention of 1868, the political spirit displayed in 
the convention, and the chief features of the new constitu- 
tion through which the State gained restoration. 

5. The operations of the Freedmen's Bureau in South 
Carolina, which operations, designed to promote the general 
welfare of the blacks, were beneficial in some respects but 
in other ways harmful. 

The writer desires to make grateful acknowledgment for 
the many courtesies extended to him in the use of the library 



8 Preface. [8 

of Columbia University, New York, the library of the South 
Carolina College, the library of Congress, the Charleston 
library, the valuable historical collections of Mr. August 
Kohn, Columbia, South Carolina, and the newspaper files in 
the office of The Columbia State. In addition, he has re- 
ceived many helpful suggestions from various gentlemen, 
among whom especially are to be mentioned Professor Wil- 
liam A. Dunning of Columbia University, and Senator Till- 
man, the late Professor R. M. Davis, the late General Ed- 
ward McCrady, Ex-Governor D. H. Chamberlain, and Judge 
A. C. Haskell, all of South Carolina. Last, and chiefly, he 
wishes to express his indebtedness for the counsel and assist- 
ance of his instructors, Professors Vincent and Willoughby, 
and Doctor J. C. Ballagh, of the Johns Hopkins University. 

Johns Hopkins University, June, 1904. 



THE EARLY PERIOD OF RECONSTRUCTION 
IN SOUTH CAROLINA 



CHAPTER I. 
Introduction. 

The attitude and policy of South CaroHna towards recon- 
struction can be better understood by remembering at the 
outset that the State sustained a pecuHar relation to the 
Union on account of the views of the constitution there main- 
tained. From the days of nullification onward the theory of 
State sovereignty constantly gained headway, and long be- 
fore the breaking out of the Civil War it had acquired among 
the people an overshadowing influence as a political doc- 
trine. Having once asserted the right of nullification and 
having steadily championed the doctrine afterwards, it was 
but natural for South Carolina to be the leader among the 
Southern States in the secession movement. 

The deep-seated belief in the sovereignty of the State and 
the political leadership which South Carolina had long held 
at the South, had a two-fold effect upon reconstruction. 
First, a decided spirit of non-submission to outside control 
had been fostered. There had been an appeal to the sword 
with desolation in the State as the result. But this did not 
mean that State rights, so thoroughly taught by Mr. Cal- 
houn, and so long maintained, had been instantly forgotten. 
The sovereignty of the State and the splendor of the old 
regime had been preserved in memory at least. Perhaps the 
belief in the theory of State rights had even been intensified 
by the disastrous consequences of the war. 



lo Early Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [ lo 

Second, the difficulties of reconstruction in South 
Carolina were increased by the measures of retaHation that 
had been undertaken against her. It will be seen later that 
the State as the " hot-bed of rebellion " — as the " ringleader " 
in the opposition to the Federal government — was singled 
out by the United States military authorities as the object 
of special punishment. The effect of this upon public opin- 
ion was decidedly important. 

It is, however, not the purpose of this study to dwell on 
the ante-bellum events in South Carolina that had a bearing 
on reconstruction. Such a discussion belongs more appro- 
priately to another field of investigation. But it is proposed 
in this connection to review briefly the military operations in 
South Carolina during the war, in order to exhibit the 
condition of the State industrially, immediately after the 
conflict, and to point out additional facts that wielded an 
influence in shaping the later political policy. It will 
also illustrate, in part, the feeling entertained towards 
the State. These operations will be discussed only in so 
far as they are considered to have borne directly upon sub- 
sequent events. 

The chief military event in South Carolina at the begin- 
ning of the Civil War was the capture of Fort Sumter by 
the Confederates, an occurrence which ushered in the con- 
flict. After the fall of Sumter, a fleet of twenty-five Federal 
gunboats was sent to blockade Charleston harbor. This 
blockade was not raised until the close of hostilities in 1865. 
But it was difficult to shut up a harbor which had a water- 
front of six miles and the blockade never was very 
effective. The attempts made to obstruct the numerous 
passages by the sinking of hulks were not successful. 
Many vessels ran the blockade and reached Charleston. 
The Charleston newspapers reported the arrival and 
departure of vessels as regularly and as openly as before the 
war.* One account states that out of 592 attempted trips 

* Charles Cowley, Leaves from a Lawyer's Life Afloat and Ashore, 
p. no. 



ii] Introduction. ii 

between January i, 1863, and April 15, 1864, 498 were suc- 
cessful. Thus trade and business generally were not com- 
pletely interrupted, as would at first appear. But in other 
respects Charleston soon began to feel the weight of the 
heavy hand of war. Before long the blockade grew into a 
siege, and the shells from Federal guns began to have a 
very telling effect on the city. It was reported in the spring 
of 1864 that, in the lower part of town, fourteen parallel 
streets were deserted and that probably over five hundred 
homes had been struck.^ Walls were torn through, windows 
smashed, doors splintered, and roofs destroyed. All the 
down-town churches of the city were in ruins.^ But though 
the Federals gained one fortification after another until 
only Fort Sumter remained in the hands of the Confeder- 
ates, the city stood out heroically against the siege for 576 
days, or until February 20, 1865.* 

Perhaps an equally significant military event of the war 
in South Carolina was the expedition against Port Royal, 
which place with the surrounding district later became the 
field of important movements. Besides being the finest har- 
bor on the South Atlantic coast. Port Royal was considered 
a point of strategic value to be used as a base for operations 
against Charleston and Savannah. A fleet of naval vessels, 
assigned to the command of Commodore S. F. Dupont, and 
thirty-three transports, carrying about 15,000 troops, under 
General T. W. Sherman, arrived off Hilton Head Island 
about November 5, 1861, and proceeded to make an assault 
on Fort Walker, located on the island. Only a feeble resist- 
ance was offered, as the Confederates had withdrawn their 
troops in considerable numbers from the coast defences and 
concentrated them in Virginia. The attack resulted in the 
capture of Fort Walker, November 7, 1861.° The other sea 
islands with their fortifications were successively occupied 

* The New York Times, Apr. 17, 1864. 

* The spire of historic St. Michael's Church was used as a target 
for the Federal artillery. Cowley, p. ri6. 

*The Charleston Courier, Apr. 18, 1865. 

° Appleton's Annual Cyclopedia, 1861, p. 290. 



12 Early Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [ 12 

by the Union forces, as was also the town of Beaufort, the 
chief local center. Somewhat later, the whole district lying 
between the Combahee and Savannah rivers, together with 
all the sea islands, fell into the hands of the Federals and 
was held by them unmolested until the close of the war. 

In many respects this part of South Carolina fared worse 
than any other in the State. It was the richest agricultural 
district, being the chief section devoted to the production of 
fine long-stapled sea-island cotton, and containing, besides, 
extensive rice fields. It was also the largest slave-holding 
parish in the State, the slaves numbering 32,000.° Many of 
the wealthiest planters of South Carolina had their summer 
residences at Beaufort and on the islands, while throughout 
the section were to be found the homes of families repre- 
senting the pride of Southern aristocracy. Upon the cap- 
ture of the islands the white people retreated inland, and 
the forcibly abandoned farms were for the time confiscated 
and turned over to the negroes.' It was practically no better 
on the main land. Beaufort became a " deserted village " 
so far as its former white residents were concerned. Early 
in June, 1863, Colonel Montgomery, with five companies of 
a negro regiment, started from Beaufort and made an expe- 
dition about twenty miles up the Combahee river. General 
devastation seems to have been the chief object of the expe- 
dition. All the slaves at work on the plantations, about 800, 
were taken to Beaufort ; and squads of colored soldiers were 
sent in various directions to burn buildings, and secure 
provisions and other property. One account states that 
every house, barn or other building belonging to any known 
secessionist was burned, and all the portable property of 
value carried ofif. In this way, several rice mills and nu- 
merous storehouses filled with rice and cotton were burned. 
One storehouse that was fired contained two years' crops of 
rice, and another, $10,000 worth of cotton. The burning of 

" Appleton's Annual Cyclopedia, 1861, p. 298. 

' South Carolina correspondence to New York Tribune, Jan. 2y, 
1864. 



13] Introduction. 13 

twenty-five buildings, many of them containing immense 
quantities of rice, was credited to one company alone. The 
locks, by which the plantations were irrigated, were broken, 
causing the rice fields to be flooded and the young crop to be 
destroyed. Large quantities of household furniture were 
brought away as trophies of the expedition. The same ac- 
count also gives this further information : '' About the 
same time that the above raid was made, Colonel Barton, 
with a large, picked force, made an expedition on three 
steamers to the village of Bluffton. The village was cap- 
tured with but little opposition, and burned to the ground, 
only one building, a church, being spared." ' 

The district that thus fell into the hands of the Federals 
comprised the principal area in South Carolina that came 
under the sway of the Union authorities. Aside from the 
bombardment of Charleston, already mentioned, no further 
military operations of importance took place in South Caro- 
lina till the beginning of 1865. The regular State govern- 
ment held control of almost all of the State and continued 
in practically undisturbed operation through the war.* Thus 
South Carolina, unlike most of the Southern States, main- 
tained without serious molestation, her status as a Confed- 
erate commonwealth about as long as the Confederacy lasted. 

The Federal policy of invasion having been by land rather 
than by water. South Carolina, by her geographical posi- 
tion, was practically free from the presence of Union sol- 
diers until near the collapse of the Confederacy. Hence 
there were few problems in local government growing out 
of military occupation, such as there were in the States of 
Louisiana, Mississippi, and Tennessee. The trend of mili- 
tary affairs indicated clearly that the war was almost over 
when General Sherman completed his raid through South 
Carolina and passed into North Carolina, there to meet and 
dictate terms of capitulation to General Johnston. In the 

' Appleton's Annual Cyclopedia, 1864, p. 824. 
' Ibid., p. 725. 



14 Early Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [ 14 

short time that elapsed between the raid and the surrender 
of the Confederate armies, very little opportunity was given 
to inaugurate a military government, and during the interval 
matters continued in a chaotic condition. 

It is perhaps important to point out that there was not in 
South Carolina, even during the last months of the war, any 
clearly defined movement or sentiment for peace. As the 
tide of the war rolled nearer the spirit of the people seems 
to have grown more and more determined. Upon the ap- 
proach of General Sherman toward the borders of the State, 
those hitherto considered unfit for military duty — school 
boys and old men — were enlisted as soldiers and sent to swell 
the ranks of the little band opposing the invader. In his 
inaugural address of December 19, 1864, Governor Magrath 
urged the people not to hesitate in their purpose or falter in 
its execution so long as peace with independence was not 
secure. He pointed out that a hostile army, cruel and un- 
relenting, threatened to invade their soil, and exhorted the 
people to the last measure of resistance — to a willing death, 
if need be — in the struggle that was at hand." 

The leading newspapers, too, manifested a like spirit of 
non-submission. The Charleston Mercury, well known as a 
pronounced State-rights organ, vigorously urged resistance 
and cited the noble example of Marion and his men, when 
the State was overrun during the Revolution." 

The women of the State also displayed a willingness 
to take part in heroic measures. A lady writing from Pen- 
dleton urged that women be substituted for men in govern- 

" Published in the Charleston Mercury, Dec. 22, 1864. 

" The following is part of an editorial in the Mercury of Nov. 19, 
1864: 

"What cause is there for despondency? Are we degenerated from 
our ancestors? Can we not endure to keep what they endured to 
win for us. Or rather shall we not imitate their noble example and 
rise in spirit with the difficulties as they accumulate? — bring forth 
a more devoted energy to meet greater disasters, and enforce upon 
our enemies the conviction that they can never subdue us to their 
domination? Submission in such a righteous cause! Submission 
to a people whom we have beaten in every equal fight! Submission 
to the base, cruel, hateful, and hated yankee ! Never — never ! " 



15] Introduction. 15 

ment positions of a stationary character, thereby allowing 
the men to go to the front. " In this crisis of our country's 
fate," said she, appeaHng to the women, " let us arise and 
do our part. Let us also be held worthy to toil for our 
country, our homes, our children, and our dead. How noble 
and glorious the toil which fills a man's place and gives a 
soldier more to the armies of our country. We have seen 
the whole treasury department filled by ladies, let us now 
see the stationary commissary departments, leaving a few 
men to perform those parts whichi require most strength and 
exposure." ^^ An opportunity to ascertain the sentiment of 
the people relative to acceptable terms of peace was pre- 
sented through a letter to President Davis from W. W. 
Boyce, a member of the Confederate Congress. Boyce 
urged upon Davis that it was expedient for the Confederates 
to join with the Northern conservative Democrats, who pro- 
posed that the war should cease, at least temporarily, and 
that all the States should meet in amicable council to make 
peace if possible. He went on to say that the only hope of 
a satisfactory peace lay in the ascendency of this party at 
some time or other, and that in order to aid in promoting 
this ascendency the Confederacy should declare her willing- 
ness for an armistice and a convention of all the States in 
their sovereign capacity. At the same time he hinted at a 
policy of reorganization under the Stars and Stripes, closing 
his letter thus : " A weak power engaged with a stronger 
must make up in sagacity what it lacks in physical force, 
otherwise the monuments of its glory become the tombs of 
its nationality." " 

This letter caused a storm of protest, and brought down 
bitter denunciations upon the writer. At mass meetings 
held in different parts of his congressional district, Boyce 
was charged with being a reconstructionist, and resolu- 
tions condemnatory of his policy and inviting him to re- 

" Printed in the Mercury, Nov. i, 1864. 

" Printed in the Charleston Courier, Oct. 13, 1864. 



i6 Early Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [ i6 

sign his seat in Congress were adopted." In discussing the 
policy advocated by Boyce, the Courier took the position 
that proffers of peace should first be made by the Federal 
authorities. " It is they who forced us to take up arms," 
said the editor, " and we must fight until we oblige them to 
acknowledge their inability to conquer and enthrall us. We 
can only extort that confession by maintaining our position, 
by thwarting and frustrating their well-laid plans, by beat- 
ing back their powerful armies, by wresting our territory 
from their grasp, and if need be by carrying the war into 
their own borders." " 

Many must have seen at this time that the Confederacy 
was doomed, and that the efforts being made by the governor 
and others to resist Sherman's invasion were utterly use- 
less. But if there were these, few or many, the existing 
records indicate that they observed a discreet silence. 

It is not to be inferred that the people did not desire 
peace. They desired it most earnestly, by armistice and 
negotiation with the North, provided they could be assured 
beforehand that the terms of peace would be to their satis- 
faction. But they were on no account in favor of a peace 
which brought them again under the dominion of the United 
States. The citizens of Fairfield district, in a public meet- 
ing called to take action on Boyce's letter, passed a resolu- 
tion that they were utterly opposed to reconstruction under 
any circumstances. At the same time they expressed a de- 
sire that all honorable efforts be made by diplomacy to put 



" Courier, Oct. 24, 1864. The following is the preamble of the 
Boyce resolutions passed at the anti-peace mass meeting at Columbia : 

" With Mr. Boyce's motives and intentions we have no concern. 
The tendency of the letter is to instil feelings of submission and 
suggest the zvish for reconstruction. Its logic is more directly op- 
posed to secession and a separate confederacy than in favor of the 
measure as a remedy proposed in our extreme distress. It is full 
of gloomy despondency and is calculated to create dissatisfaction 
with our government, and to reconcile us to that of our enemy and 
to dispirit our army in the field." — New York Herald, Oct. 29, 1864. 
1864. 

" Courier, Nov. 9, 1864. 



17] Introduction. 17 

an end to the war on terms consistent with the safety and 
independence of the Confederate States.'" 

Perhaps those who favored reconstruction in conformity 
with the constitution of the United States — and there must 
have been some such — would have spoken their preferences, 
if the State had been in the control of the Federal soldiers. 
But as it was, the war party being strongly in the majority, 
an apparent general unanimity prevailed to offer all the re- 
sistance possible. The legislature declared that all free 
white men between the ages of sixteen and sixty years 
were liable to militia service ; and the governor ordered all 
such persons to come forth for the defense of the State. 
He said in his proclamation that the free proffer of service 
was what the State desired, and that service not proffered 
would be demanded." 

This, in general, was the aspect of affairs about the first 
of January, 1865, when Sherman, in his " March to the Sea," 
had reached and was occupying Savannah, and proposed as 
his next move to cross over into the Palmetto State. The 
unbroken spirit of the South Carolinians would seem extra- 
ordinary in view of the rumor abroad that the " original 
seedbed of the heresy of secession " was to be the object of 
special vengeance to the invading army. Evidence of this 
intended vengeance, especially for Charleston, is given in the 
following correspondence : 

Headquarters of the Army. 
Washington, Dec. 18, 1864. 
Major-General W. T. Sherman, Savannah. 

My dear General : Should you capture Charleston, I 

hope that by some accident the place may be destroyed, and if a 

" Mercury, Nov. 12, 1864. Late in 1864 the following resolution 
was introduced in the South Carolina Senate: "That the termin- 
ation of the present iniquitous and bloody war is an object devoutly 
to be desired by the Confederate States, but only on terms of ab- 
solute separation from the United States." — New York Herald, Dec. 
II, 1864. 

"The proclamation is published in the Courier, Jan. 25, 1865. 



i8 Early Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [ i8 

little salt could be sown upon its site, it may prevent the growth 
of future crops of nullification and secession. 
Yours truly, 
H. W. Halleck, Major-General, Chief of Staff" 

Headquarters Military Division of the Mississippi. 

In the Field, Savannah, December 24, 1864. 
Major-General H. W. Halleck, Chief of Staff, Washington, D. C. 

Dear General : I will bear in mind your hint as to 

Charleston, and do not think " salt " will be necessary. When I 
move, the Fifteenth Corps will be on the right of the right wing, 
and their position will naturally bring them into Charleston first ; 
and if you have watched the history of that corps, you will have re- 
marked that they do their work pretty well. 

I remain, as ever, your friend, 

W. T. Sherman, Major-General." 

As to the feeling of extreme bitterness toward South Caro- 
Hna General Sherman's own statement is authority. He 
says : " Somehow our men had got the idea that South 
Carolina was the cause of all our troubles ; her people were 
the first to fire on Fort Sumter, had been in a great hurry 
to precipitate the country into civil war ; and therefore on 
them should fall the scourge of war in its worst form. 
Taunting messages had also come to us when in Georgia to 
the effect that when we should reach South Carolina we 
should find a people less passive, who would fight us to the 
bitter end, daring us to come over, etc. ; so that I saw and 
felt that we would not be able longer to restrain our men, 
as we had done in Georgia." "" The army correspondent of 
the New York Herald wrote that the feeling of bitterness 
was universal in the army, and testimony to the same effect 
may be had from other sources."' 



" Memoirs of Gen. W. T. Sherman, Vol. H, p. 222. 

" Ibid., p. 226. 

'" Ibid., p. 269. 

^^ New York Herald, March 20, 1865. The following is an editorial 
in the New York Times of Dec. 28, 1864 : " Sherman's soldiers are 
intensely anxious to be led into South Carolina. They are eager 
beyond measure to take a promenade through the Rattle-Snake 

State. We do not wonder at it South Carolina is the 

guiltiest of all the rebel states. It was South Carolina that gave 



iq] Introduction. 19 

As a memorable event in South Carolina the Sherman 
raid is perhaps without a parallel. By the object lesson 
which accompanied his definition of war, General Sherman 
established his capital truth with decided emphasis. The 
actual strength of the army during the campaign of the 
Carolinas was sixty thousand and seventy-nine men. The 
animals employed in the army numbered at least forty thou- 
sand,"^ and both man and beast are said to have fared sump- 
tuously." Soldiers and stock alike were fed almost exclu- 
sively from the granaries and cornfields through which they 
passed, and upon such beef cattle, poultry, etc., as could be 
gathered along the line of march."" Of course, this army had 
to be subsisted, and by all the rights of war the commanding 
general was justifiable in allowing his army to live off the 
country. But the size of the army and the manner of pro- 
curing the means of subsistence, together with the heavy 
demands previously made by the Confederacy, meant prac- 
tically complete exhaustion for the State. The army cor- 
respondent of the New York Times estimated the following 
as the amount of food-stuffs, live stock, etc., taken from the 
State by Sherman's army : 15,000 head of beef cattle, 500,000 
pounds of bacon and pork, 3,000,000 pounds of flour and 
meal, 1,000,000 bushels of corn, 5000 horses and mules, and 
a countless variety of articles of food of general utility."" 

But it is not by the drain that was made on the resources of 
the State that the raid is chiefly remembered. As will be seen 
further on, much ruin was wrought to real property, from 
the effects of which the State has scarcely yet recovered. 
And, besides, the accounts would seem to indicate that a 
large portion of this waste was needless. The army seemed 



birth to the master traitor Calhoun, idolized him living and canonized 
him when dead ; it was South Carolina that incited and forced other 
States to disunion; it was South Carolina that passed the first ordi- 
nance of secession ; it was South Carolina that began the war." 

"" New York World, Apr. 14, 1865. 

^ Army correspondence of the New York Times, Apr. 8, 1865. 

"" New York Times, Apr. 8, 1865. 

"" New York Times, Apr. 8, 1865. , 



20 Early Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [ 20 

instinct with the spirit of wholesale destruction, and from ap- 
pearances they were allowed by those in command to have 
their way. General Sherman practically admits this when 
he says : " I would not restrain the army, lest its vigor and 
energy should be impaired." ^^ According to one writer, 
the " standing order " was to pillage and burn to the ground 
every abandoned dwelling ; but if occupied, then to pillage 
but not to burn." It is said that Sherman's track across the 
State could for a long time be traced by the blackened chim- 
neys, all that remained standing of once magnificent homes.^ 
" Wide spreading columns of smoke rose wherever the army 
went." ^ 



"' Sherman's Memoirs, II, p. 254. 

'"J. A. Leland, A Voice from South Carolina, p. 7. 

^ W. G. Simms, Sack and Destruction of the City of Columbia, p. 
22. The New York News' special correspondent has this report in the 
issue of that newspaper for September 27, 1865 : " South CaroHna has 
indeed felt the oppressor's heel. Sherman passed through the State 
and made a track forty miles wide as plain as fire, plunder, and 
utter devastation could make it. In many places the only marks of 
former life are the chimneys left standing to tell where once gathered 
happy families." 

^The following correspondence, quoted from Appleton's Cyclo- 
pedia, 1865, p. 43, is cited : 

Grahams, S. C, February 7, 1865. 

General : I have the honor to propose that if the troops of your 
army be required to discontinue burning the houses of our citizens, 
I will discontinue burning cotton. ... I trust you will not deem it 
improper for me to ask that you will require the troops under your 
command to discontinue the wanton destruction of property, not 
necessary for their sustenance. 

Respectfully, General, your obedient servant, 

J. Wheeler, Major-General, C. S. A. 

Headquarters Military Division of the Mississippi. 

In the Field, Feb. 8, 1865. 
General : Yours addressed to Gen. Howard is received by me. I 
hope you will burn all cotton and save us the trouble. We don't 
want it and it has proven a curse to our country. All you don't 
burn I will. As to private houses occupied by peaceful citizens, my 
orders are not to molest or disturb them, and I think my orders are 
obeyed. Vacant houses being of no use to anybody, I care little 
about, as the owners have thought them of no use to themselves. 
I don't want them destroyed, but I do not take much care to preserve 
them. 

I am, with respect, yours truly, 

W. T. Sherman, Major-General, Commanding. 



21 ] Introduction. ' 21 

The general direction of Sherman's course through South 
CaroHna was due north from Savannah, thence in a north- 
easterly direction toward Fayetteville, N. C.'° The first 
districts in the State reached by the army were Beaufort 
and Barnwell, or what is now Hampton. The country man- 
sions of the districts, such as had escaped previous raids, 
were burned and the people left desolate/^ The towns of 
Buford's Bridge, Barnwell,'' Grahamville, Robertsville,'' 
Bamberg, and Midway next fell in the track of the army, 
where the same policy of plunder and burning is reported 
to have been carried out. This brought the army up to the 
South Carolina Railroad, which extended from Augusta, via 
Branchville, to Charleston. This road was very important 
as a means for forwarding supplies from Augusta and north- 
ern Georgia to Richmond. The troops were immediately 
set to work to destroy the road and did so thoroughly for a 
distance of about fifty miles — from Branchville to near 
Aiken." 



^° Appleton, 1865, p. 42. 

^' Simms, p. 8. In the same connection he has this to say : " The 
inhabitants, black, no less than white, were left to starve, compelled 
to feed, only upon the garbage to be found in the abandoned camps 
of the soldiers. The corn scraped up from the spots where horses 
fed has been the only means of life to the thousands but lately in 
affluence." 

" General O. O. Howard, in a series of newspaper articles, pub- 
lished after the raid, relates the following conversation : 

General Howard : " By the way, General, I heard a good joke 
about you yesterday." 

Gen. Kilpatrick: "What was it?" 

Gen. Howard : " It was this : Gen. Sherman said that you, Kil- 
patrick, were changing the names of places about here, so that 
soon a new geography would have to be made. He said he sent you 
up to Barnwell the other day, and that you had changed the name 
of the place to Burn-well." — New York Times, May 13, 1865. 

" " A mile and a half further on we found the smouldering ashes 

of Robertsville Not a building was saved from the flames." 

Doyle's dispatch to the New York Herald, March 18, 1863. 

^ Says General Sherman : '' As soon as we struck the railroad, 
details of men were set to tear up the rails, to burn the ties, and twist 
the bars. This was a most important railroad and I proposed to 
destroy it completely for fifty miles, partly to prevent a possibility 
of its restoration, and partly to utilize the time necessary for General 
Slocum to get up." — Memoirs, II, p. 259. 



22 Early Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [22 

The movement on Orangeburg, about twenty miles north 
of Branchville, was next commenced. At the same time the 
left wing of the army swept the country to the west, extend- 
ing as far as Lexington. Arrived at Orangeburg, one corps 
gave its attention to the matter of destroying the railroad 
toward the north, which work was done effectually for a 
distance of twelve miles.^ Leaving the court-house towns of 
Lexington and Orangeburg in ashes, meanwhile having de- 
stroyed a bridge across the Congaree River near Kingville, 
General Sherman took up the line of march toward the capi- 
tal of the State. The army arrived on the western bank of 
the Congaree, opposite Columbia, February 16, one column 
having been advanced toward the northwest to break up the 
railroads and bridges about Alston. Upon the approach of 
the Federals, the small detachment of Confederate cavalry 
withdrew, leaving the city unreservedly to the enemy. On 
the next day the mayor made a formal surrender, requesting 
at the same time protection of private property. 

Sherman's orders relative to the occupation of the city 
are as follows : " General Howard will cross the Saluda 
and Broad Rivers as near their mouths as possible, occupy 
Columbia, destroy the public buildings, railroad property, 
manufacturing and machine shops ; but will spare libraries, 
asylums and private dwellings. He will then move to 
Winnsboro, destroying en route, utterly, that section of the 
railroad. He will also cause all bridges, trestles, and water 
tanks back to the Wateree to be burned, switches broken, 
and such other destruction as he can find time to accomplish, 
consistent with proper celerity." '° 

It is not proposed here to take up again the question of 
to whom belongs the responsibility of burning Columbia. 
South Carolinians, upon what seemed to them reasonable 
proof," placed the blame entirely upon General Sherman and 

*°Appleton, 1865, p. 44. 

'"'Memoirs, II, p. 277. 

"See Gibbcs, Who Burned Columbia? 



23] Introduction. 23 

his army. This beHef had the effect of greatly augmenting 
the bitterness of the people toward the North. 

The losses sustained in the sack and burning of Columbia 
were very great, traces of which are still partially discernible. 
The fire swept over eighty-four squares of the city, consum- 
ing in all 1386 separate buildings. Among these were four 
churches, numerous warehouses filled with cotton, all the 
passenger and freight depots and railroad work-shops, the 
city hall and postoffice, five banks, many government stores, 
the principal hotel, a Jewish synagogue, and a Catholic con- 
vent, and all the business and manufacturing houses on 
Main street.^ The loss was greatly augmented for the rea- 
son that Columbia was looked upon as one of the most 
secure places of refuge. It was thought that, as the city 
contained so many of the manufactures of the Confederate 
government, the treasury, the commissary stores, the powder 
magazines, etc., the place would be defended with the utmost 
energy. Moreover, the city was an important railroad cen- 
ter. Hence the banks of Charleston, together with many 
in other parts of the State, had removed thither their assets. 
In addition to their ordinary assets, several had brought 
for safe-keeping other treasure of great value, such as 
silver plate, jewels, bonds, pictures, and works of art. Hun- 
dreds of farmers also had fled before the advancing army 
and taken refuge in Columbia, bringing with them whatever 
of valuables they could carry.''' These facts will explain how 
the loss from plunder and fire fell unusually heavily upon 
the whole State. Doubtless many things would have been 
saved, had there been means of removing them.. But trans- 
portation facilities had been cut off, and there was no way 
of escaping with the treasure. 

The army " having utterly ruined Columbia " — these 

" Simms, p. 57, et seq. ; New York Herald, June 28, 1865. The 
Herald's field correspondent gave this account : " I will simply 
observe that the night of FriHay, Feb. 17, would have cracked 
Alaric's brain if he had witnessed it."— Herald, March 18, 1865. 

'" Notes of a conversation with the late James G. Gibbes. 



24 Early Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [24 

words are General Sherman's '" — began the march northward 
towards Winnsboro, which place was reached on February 
21. The left wing of the army had swung around to the 
northwest, destroying the villages of Alston and Pomaria.*' 
General Sherman's order, quoted above, was fully carried 
out, and the railroad from Columbia to Winnsboro, a dis- 
tance of thirty miles, was destroyed as was also forty miles 
of the road leading toward Florence/' The town of Winns- 
boro met a fate similar to that of others in the track of the 
army. The public square was destroyed, as well as the Epis- 
copal church and other property." 

From Winnsboro, the course of the army was towards the 
northeast, through part of Chester, and through Kershaw, 
Lancaster, and Chesterfield districts. The principal towns 
and villages in this scope of country were Blackstock, Society 
Hill, Camden and Cheraw, and to these the torch was applied 
more or less ruthlessly. At Camden, two railroad depots, 
an engine house, two thousand sacks of flour and corn meal, 
twenty hogsheads of rice, two thousand bales of cotton and a 
large flouring mill were together burnt or carried off.^' The 
business portion of Cheraw, the chief town in Chesterfield 
district, was burned, except one house. Nor was it upon 
the towns alone that the iron hand of war fell. The rural 
districts were likewise devastated." General F, P. Blair, 
U. S. A., writing on this point, said : " Every house that one 
passes is pillaged, and I think, as we are about to enter North 
Carolina, the people should be treated more considerately." *° 

The army passed out of South Carolina about March 8, 



"Memoirs, II, p. 288. ^' Gibbes, p. 59. *^ Memoirs, II, p. 274. 

*^ Report of Committee on Destruction of Churches, Diocese of 
S. C, p. 14. 

** Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies, Series I, 
Serial No. 98, p. 353. 

" This is the testimony of a Federal soldier relative to the de- 
vastation of the country: "Wherever a view could be had from 
the high ground, black columns of smoke were seen rising here and 
there in a circuit of thirty miles." New York Herald, March 15, 
1865. 

" OflScial Records, Series I; Serial No. 99, p. 717. 



25] Introduction. 25 

and when it had passed there is very good authority for say- 
ing that the country was scarcely recognizable. General 
O. O. Howard later gave the following testimony relative 
to this subject: " I went over the country afterwards, and 
it was pretty completely cleared out ; I saw the chimneys 
and scarcely anything left in the country through there." ■" 
Outside of the army's track, much loss was incurred by 
people who, in anticipation of the soldiers, buried things of 
value and had to leave them in the ground until they were 
ruined. Various devices were resorted to, to provide against 
the expected pillage.'" 

It is perhaps safe to say that no Southern State paid so 
dearly in proportion to its means for its resistance to the 
National government as did South Carolina. Summing up 
her accumulated misfortunes, it may be said that out of 
146,000 white males of all ages in the State at the census of 
i860, she lost 40,000 by death or disablement. This is a rate 
of one for every three and six-tenths. The loss in slave 
property was far greater proportionally than in any other 
Southern State, for she had proportionally far more of it. 
There were in the State at the beginning of the war 402,406 
slaves, while the entire white population numbered only 
291,386." The value of the slave property is said to have 
been $200,000,000. A writer in the Charleston News makes 
the statement that the assets of the banks of the State were 
$5,000,000, all of which were lost. Of the $5,000,000 of 
bills in circulation, the market value is reported to have 
been not more than twenty per cent of their face value. All 
of the large and valuable estates in Beaufort district and on 



*' Gibbes, p. 105. 

" One lady tells the following story : " Besides my war pockets 
which reached to the hem of my dress, I carried, hung upon a heavy 
cord about my waist, one piece of flannel, two pounds of tea, five 
pounds of coffee, twelve yards of dress goods, twelve yards of muslin, 
two pounds of sugar, a silver cup, a dozen silver forks, the same of 
spoons, spools of cotton, silk, needles, pins, etc. In my skirts were 
sewed my watch, money and private papers." 

Women of the War, No. 16. 

"New York Times, Sept. 13, 1865. 



26 Early Period of Reconstructioti in South Carolina. [26 

the adjacent islands had been abandoned, and many of them 
sold by the Federal government for taxes. A very heavy 
loss came with the burning and seizure of the vast quantities 
of cotton, the value of which at the time was estimated at 
$20,000,000. Of the horses, hogs, cattle, farming imple- 
ments, furniture, and silverware, all but an inconsiderable 
amount is reported to have been destroyed, consumed, or 
taken ; while the funds of colleges, churches, and charitable 
institutions were largely sunk. The same writer concludes 
his doleful account with the statement that, of the $400,- 
000,000 of property in South Carolina in 1861, but little more 
than $50,000,000 remained in 1865.'° 

It is reasonable to suppose that the bitterness of the peo- 
ple, already great, was considerably increased after the great 
injuries they had sustained. The ragged Confederate sol- 
dier, returning to his home, found very little of consolation 
in the spectacle of a burnt dwelling and his wife and children 
deprived of shelter and on the brink of starvation. He was 
confronted with the very practical question of at once earn- 
ing a livelihood, while the means of earning it had been in 
his absence destroyed. These things naturally augmented 
the difificulties of reconciliation, and when the time came, 
complicated the work of reconstruction. For the seeds of 
hate were thus sown, although they bore no immediate fruit. 

During the month or so that intervened between the time 
when Sherman passed out of the State and the surrender of 
the Confederate armies, there seems to have been little activ- 
ity, military, political or economic in South Carolina. Gov- 
ernor Magrath had fled from Columbia upon the approach 
of Sherman, and the government of the State was left with- 
out a head. The legislature tried to meet at Greenville, but 
failed to get a quorum. Only about thirty members made 
their appearance, and these met and adjourned without tak- 
ing any definite action in reference to another meeting." 

^° These estimates of losses are reprinted from the Charleston 
News in the New York Herald of Aug. 30, 1865. 
"Courier, May 10, 1865. 



27] Introduction. 27 

Governor Magrath returned to Columbia on May 2, and 
issued a proclamation announcing the surrender in North 
Carolina of the army under the command of General John- 
ston. He reminded the people that in the termination of the 
Confederate government circumstances had rendered the 
condition of South Carolina one of peculiar embarrassment. 
The consequences of the war, he said, involved a consider- 
able portion of the population in a want approaching starva- 
tion. To the end that suffering might be checked, he directed 
that all subsistence stores and property of the Confederate 
States within the limits of the State should be held for the 
purpose of furnishing support to the thousands who were 
destitute, and in want of food, and whose suffering could 
only be alleviated by this disposition of the supplies." 

On May 8, the governor, in order that civil government 
might be restored without delay, directed that all officers of 
the State, " with all convenient promptitude," should return 
to Columbia, reopen their offices, and resume their proper 
duties.°^ It is evident that Governor Magrath did not com- 
prehend the real status of the State. General Gilmore, com- 
manding the Department of the South, issued an order that 
the proclamation of A. G. Magrath, " styling himself gover- 
nor of South Carolina " and directing that subsistence stores 
should be issued for the relief of the people of the State, was 
■declared null and void. The order further enjoined the 
people to give no heed whatever to any orders, proclama- 
tions, commissions, or commands emanating from any per- 
son claiming the right to exercise the functions and author- 
ity of governor in the State of South Carolina." 

Upon the promulgation of this order, Governor Magrath 
sent a reply to General Gilmore, giving as his reason for the 
action taken in regard to the subsistence stores, the destitute 
condition of the people in the upper districts of the State. 
At the same time and in view of the fact that " sundry and 
divers acts of treason " had been charged against him and 

''-Courier, May 10, 1865. "Ibid., May 18, 1865. 

" Printed in the Courier, May 25, 1865. 



28 Early Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [28 

his authority as governor denied, Magrath issued an address 
to the people stating that his functions as executive had 
ceased, and that the State was in the hands of the miHtary 
authorities of the United States. He also announced that 
the proclamation relative to subsistence stores had been 
recalled. He reminded the people that the war was over 
and that it was their duty to reconcile themselves to that 
submission which the government of the United States could 
impose and they could not resist. " Whatever may be your 
condition," he continued, " unavailing resistance on your 
part will but make it worse. With an earnestness of the 
sincerity of which I need not give you assurance, I urge 
upon you the resumption of your peaceful pursuits, and the 
adaptation of yourselves to those changes which may be made 
in your condition. Do not be misled by excitement ; give no 
heed to passion ; deal resolutely with facts ; look the truth 
clearly in the face ; spill no more blood ; accept with the 
dignity which even misfortune can command, the condition 
which you cannot avert." °° 

On May 25, General Gilmore sent a detachment of soldiers 
to Columbia and arrested Governor Magrath on the charge 
of high treason. He was imprisoned at Fort Pulaski, Savan- 
nah, until December, when he was released on parole."" 

The imprisonment of the governor, the existence of mar- 
tial law, and the consequent disruption of the State govern- 
ment, left South Carolina in a sad condition. Her people 
were for the time deeply humiHated. They had already 
known what it meant to be the object of special vengeance, 
and forebodings of the future appeared to be equally gloomy. 
It was feared that South Carolina, jeered at as the " nest 
wherein was hatched the snake of secession," would lose her 
status as a State entirely and become part of the national 
public domain. Vast tracts of her territory along the coast 
and the sea islands had even then been confiscated and 
rumors of entire confiscation were everywhere prevalent. 

"Courier, May 29, 1865. 

" Charleston Year Book, 1895, p. 372. 



29] Introduction. 29 

The negroes, too, had come to identify freedom with idle- 
ness, and idleness had brought its ever-present companion, 
mischief. Lawlessness and crime were alarmingly on the 
increase."' 

Hence a desire for the re-establishment of some form of 
civil authority was early evinced. The Federal law was 
admitted to be the only source of protection, and steps were 
soon taken to call a general convention to take action in the 
premises. It early became known that the President in- 
tended to appoint a provisional governor for South Caro- 
lina, as soon as the people expressed a willingness to renew 
their loyalty to the Union. Accordingly resolutions were 
adopted at various public meetings in the State, to the effect 
that it was the duty of all citizens to refrain from every act 
of hostility and to promote the return of friendly feeling 
toward the United States. The citizens of Charleston did 
not even wait for the holding of a convention, but on their 
own authority memorialized President Johnson to appoint 
at once a representative citizen provisional governor. The 
memorial set forth that the determination was universal to 
be in spirit and in truth loyal, and to do all that became 
citizens of the United States to promote the prosperity of 
their country.'* The city sent a committee to Washington 
to present a memorial to the President. Judge Frost, Col- 
onel Yates, and Messrs. Isaac Holmes, Geo. W. Williams, 
Frederick Williams, J. A. Sternmeyer, and William Whaley, 
were among the members of the delegaiion.^" 

About this time a report reached the State that there 
would probably be considerable delay in the South Carolina 
appointment, inasmuch as the delegation at Washington did 
not represent the Unionist sentiment. A. G. Mackey, col- 
lector of the port of Charleston, was in Washington and 
seems to have done what he could to delay the appointment 
of a provisional governor. He denounced the delegates as 

" Courier. June 29, 1865. 

"'The memorial is printed in the New York Times, June 10, 1865. 

°° New York Times, June 25, 1865. 



30 E.arly Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [30 

original secessionists and violent rebels, and tried to destroy 
any claim they made to confidence or honesty of purpose.*" 
Another matter that disturbed the people was the attitude 
of some of the Northern newspapers toward the State. It 
was reported that South Carolina, on account of her rebel- 
lious instincts, might be kept under martial law indefinitely." 
However, fortunately or unfortunately for the State, these 
rumors relative to making an exception of South Carolina 
proved to be without foundation. 

Upon what terms the Charleston delegates asked to be 
restored is not known ; but it is likely that they did not lose 
much time in quibbling. The State had seen enough of war, 
devastation and anarchy. It was time for peace and order 
to prevail. The men suggested to the President as material 
from which to select a provisional governor were ex-Gover- 
nor Aiken, W. W. Boyce, Samuel McAlilley, ex-Governor 
Manning, and B. F. Perry, 

'" Courier, June 29, 1865. 

" Said the New York Herald of June 23, 1865 : " This State having 
been the first and most rampant in the rebellion, will probably be the 
last to receive the benefits of reconstruction. All the other Southern 
States will in a short time be under civil rule again, while South 
Carolina will be suffered to undergo a year or so of probation, be- 
fore she can be relieved of military dominion. That is the proper 
government for her at the present time ; for it is a question whether 
a sufficient number of loyal and trustworthy white natives can be 
found in the State to fill the civil offices. Therefore the Palmetto 
State will probably have to be content for the present with military 
rule." 



CHAPTER 11. 

Presidential Reconstruction. 

By June 21, 1865, President Johnson had appointed pro- 
visional governors in all the seceding States except South 
Carolina and Florida. Convinced of the readiness of the 
people of the State to accept his plan, on June 30 the Presi- 
dent issued a proclamation appointing Benjamin F. Perry 
provisional governor, who was looked upon by many in the 
State as the ideal man for the office.' Judge Perry was born 
in Pendleton District in 1805. He was descended from Revo- 
lutionary stock, being of common ancestry with Commodore 
Perry. He studied law at Greenville and soon won a reputa- 
tion as an attorney of decided ability. Early in life he became 
conspicuous in politics. As leader of the Union party in the 
State he was an unwavering antagonist of nullification, and 
a political opponent of Calhoun.'' His fearless and able oppo- 
sition to the doctrines of the State-rights school made him, 
for many years, the most unpopular man, politically, in 
South Carolina. When the State seemed about to secede in 
1850, he expressed the opinion that disunion would be de- 
structive of the very institutions in the South for the preser- 
vation of which the Union was to be dissolved. In opposi- 
tion to all the other South Carolina delegates, he refused to 
withdraw from the famous Charleston convention of i860, 
declaring that on the unity of the Democratic party depended 
the life of the Union. He predicted the war and the defeat 
of the South and urged that it was folly to secede with a 
Democratic majority in Congress, in the Supreme Court, 
and in the country. But when South Carolina left the Union 

' Courier, July 8, 1865. ' Ibid. 



32 Early Period of Reconstruction in SotitJi Carolina. [32 

he yielded to the majority and went with his State.' Being 
too old for active service in the field, he devoted his energies 
to the service of the Confederacy at home. During the con- 
flict he served as member of the legislature, Confederate 
commissioner, district attorney and district judge. 

The prophetic wisdom and patriotism of Judge Perry's 
course had been so amply justified by the light of later 
events that the people were now glad to have him as their 
State executive." But despite his consistent record as a 
Union man before the war, his appointment did not meet 
with the same favor at the North. In a speech delivered in 
Greenville before a public meeting, assembled for the pur- 
pose of asking a restoration of civil government, Judge 
Perry had made a rather invidious comparison between 
Presidents Lincoln and Johnson. Contrary to the general 
opinion that the South had sustained a great loss in the death 
of Lincoln, he declared that Johnson was a much abler and 
firmer man than the late President and in every way more 
acceptable to the South. At the same time he had alluded 
in a rather uncomplimentary manner to the devastation of 
the State at the hands of the Federal soldiers. This address 
was published in the Northern newspapers and President 
Johnson was roundly criticised for appointing as provisional 
governor a man of such views." 

The President's South Carolina proclamation was an exact 
copy of the one issued on May 29, inaugurating the presi- 
dential policy of reconstruction in North Carolina. It de- 
clared that, since the constitution guaranteed to every State 
a republican form of government, and since the people of 



^ " You are all going to the devil and I will go with you," he said, 
in announcing his purpose for the future. Sketches by Gov. Perry, 
p. 6. 

* Courier, July 8, 1865. 

^ The following is an editorial in the New York Tribune of July 
20, 1865 : " If there be in South Carolina no better timber than this 
wherefrom to fashion a provisional governor, we think the manu- 
facture might have wisely been postponed From the begin- 
ning to the end of this harangue there is no recognition of that 
large body of the people of South CoroHna who are not humiliated." 



33] Presidential Reconstruction. 33 

South Carolina through a rebellion waged by a portion of 
the people of the United States, had been deprived of all 
civil government, it was the President's duty, as commander- 
in-chief of the army and navy, to re-establish that form of 
government in the State to which the people were entitled. 
To further this end, the provisional governor was directed 
to prescribe without delay " such rules and regulations as 
may be necessary and proper for convening a convention 
composed of delegates to be chosen by that portion of the 
people of said State who are loyal to the people of the 
United States, and no others, for the purpose of altering or 
amending the constitution thereof and with the authority to 
exercise within the limits of said State all the powers neces- 
sary and proper to enable such loyal people of the State of 
South Carolina to restore said State to its constitutional rela- 
tions to the Federal government, and to present such a 
republican form of State government as will entitle the State 
to the guaranty of the United States, and its people to pro- 
tection by the United States against invasion, insurrection 
and domestic violence." Those who should not have pre- 
viously taken the oath prescribed in the amnesty proclama- 
tion of May 29, were to be excluded from exercising the 
privilege of electors and from becoming members of the 
convention. The convention, when assembled, was to deter- 
mine the qualifications for suffrage. The military com- 
mander of the department and his subordinates were di- 
rected to assist the provisional governor in carrying the 
proclamation into effect. The secretary of state, the secre- 
tary of the treasury, the postmaster-general, the district 
judge, the secretary of the navy, and the secretary of the 
interior, were directed to put in force, in the geographical 
limits of the State, all laws relating to their respective de- 
partments." This proclamation was followed on July 21 by a 
similar one from Provisional Governor Perry. 



•Richardson, Messages and Papers of the Presidents, Vol. VI 
p. 312. 

3 



34 Early Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [ 34 

On the ground that it was impossible to fill the various 
offices with Union men, Perry reinstated those who were in 
office when the civil government of the State was suspended 
in May, the officers being required to take the amnesty oath. 
Loyal citizens who were legal voters prior to secession and 
who had taken the amnesty oath and who were not in the 
excepted classes of the President's proclamation, were de- 
clared entitled to vote. Citizens included in the excepted 
classes were to take the oath and to apply for pardon before 
they could vote or become members of the convention. The 
delegates thus elected were required to assemble in conven- 
tion in Columbia on September 13 for the purpose of amend- 
ing the old constitution or of making a new one, which 
would conform to the recent great changes that had taken 
place in the State and which would be more in accordance 
with republican principles. In the meantime, all laws of 
force in the State prior to secession were declared to be in 
force under the provisional government, except such as con- 
flicted with this proclamation. The judges and chancellors 
were required to exercise all the powers and perform all the 
duties appertaining to their respective offices. The military 
authorities and lawful citizens of the State were called upon 
to unite in preserving peace and good order.' 

At home. Perry's proclamation gave very great satisfac- 
tion. With their own chosen officers restored and with 
freedom to regulate the status of the negroes, there was 
reason for the people to hope for better days in South 
Carolina. But the proclamation did not meet with the same 
favor at the North. Soon after its promulgation, President 
Johnson telegraphed Perry that it was reported " in high 
circles " that the provisional governors were ignoring the 
old Union men and giving a preference in all their appoint- 
ments to rebel soldiers. This report, said the President, was 
damaging the administration and giving just cause of com- 
plaint. It must be inferred from the singling out of Pro- 



'Appleton, 1865, p. 758. 



35] Presidential Reconstruction. 35 

visional Governor Perry in this way that his action was in 
part the ground of complaint. Perry replied that the report 
was untrue in his State ; that there were no truly Union men 
in South Carolina to be ignored ; and that the Union senti- 
ment had waxed strong only among some who sought office. 
He went on to say that he preferred to appoint honest, com- 
petent soldiers who had been maimed in the war rather than 
those who would identify themselves with any party for 
office, regardless of principle or country.* 

A matter that called for much of Provisional Governor 
Perry's attention was the issuing of pardons. He exercised 
this power very freely and was deluged with applications. 
No one who applied seems to have failed to receive the 
governor's recommendation. He gave as his reason for this 
liberal exercise of the power, that no one was to blame for 
taking sides with his State after she had seceded. There 
was no neutral ground, he said. H a man went against his 
State he was guilty of treason, and the Federal government 
was powerless to protect him. There were eight hundred 
and forty-five persons in the State, numbered among the 
excepted classes of the amnesty proclamation, who received 
executive clemency. Six hundred and fifty of these be- 
longed to the class excepted for being worth over $20,000. 
The rest were Confederate tax-collectors and postmasters. 
Confederate agents and blockade runners." 

The constitutional convention met according to appoint- 
ment on September 13, with the assurance from the North 
that its deliberations would be watched with close scrutiny. 
The people of South Carolina had been longer and more 
virulently alienated from the National government than 
those of any other State, it was said, and the spirit which she 
showed in the proceedings of the convention would deter- 
mine conclusively what would be her future fate." As to 

' Journal of the Constitutional Convention of 1865, p. 17. 
" Senate Document, ist session, 40th Congress, No. 32, p. 44. 
'" Said the editor of the New York Times : " If it proves to be 
the old spirit, with only such modifications in its working as getting 



36 Early Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [36 

personnel, the convention was said to have been regarded as 
the ablest body ever assembled in the State."^ Several of the 
delegates were men of national reputation. Among these 
were James L. Orr, speaker of the national House of Repre- 
sentatives prior to the war and ex-Confederate senator ; 
F. W. Pickens, late Federal congressman and first secession 
governor ; and Samuel McGowan and John Bratton, late 
brigadier-generals in the Confederate army. Twelve of the 
delegates had been members of the secession convention of 
i860. In this number were D. L. Wardlofw, president of the 
convention, and John A. Inglis, who introduced the seces- 
sion resolution." Most of the delegates had been active dur- 
ing the war on the side of the Confederacy, and it is not a 
matter of surprise that the proceedings of the convention 
were looked upon with suspicion at the North. 

Soon after its assembling, the convention heard a message 
from Provisional Governor Perry, in which he urged an 
unqualified acceptance of the issues of the war and legisla- 
tion in conformity therewith. " Instead of dwelling on the 
past and grieving over its errors and misfortunes, let us," 
said he, " with manly fortitude, look to the future and accom- 
modate ourselves to the conditions which surround us, and 
which cannot be changed or avoided," He acknowledged the 
death of slavery and urged obedience to the solemn oath, 
which the members had taken, to abide by and faithfully to 
support all laws and proclamations regarding the emancipa- 
tion of the slaves. The purpose for which they had met in 
convention, viz., to enact legislation whereby South Caro- 
lina might regain her civil rights and be restored to the 
Union, would be impossible so long as slavery was not 

back into the Union imposes, we may safely set it down that she 
will remain poverty stricken and miserable. If on the other hand 
it exhibits a radical change in keeping with the new epoch, it is 
equally certain that she will soon recover from her calamities and 
attain both a material and moral power such as she has never yet 
experienced." New York Times, Sept. 13, 1865. 

" New York Herald, Sept. 15, 1865. 

" Correspondence of the New York World, Sept. 29, 1865 ; Journal 
of the Secession Convention, p. 46. 



37] Presidential Reconstruction. 37 

abolished. In regulating the relative duties of employer and 
employe, he advised a wise, just and humane treatment of 
the freedman. If a liberal policy was pursued, the blacks 
would soon become as strongly attached to the whites in 
their new condition as they were while in slavery. Changes 
looking to the popularizing of the fundamental law were 
strongly urged. It had been the reproach of South Carolina 
that her constitution was less republican in form than that 
of any other State in the Union. To this fact many traced 
the origin of that discontent with the Federal government 
which, after having been fostered for many years, eventually 
led to secession. The parish system should be destroyed, 
representation should be in proportion to taxation and popu- 
lation, and the elections of governor and presidential electors 
should be by the people. The franchise should not be ex- 
tended to the freedmen in their ignorant and degraded con- 
dition. " This is a white man's government and the white 
man's only." The Supreme Court of the United States had 
decided that the negroes were not citizens. No notice should 
be taken of the contention of the radical Republican party 
in the North that there should be no distinction between 
voters on account of color, as each State had the unquestion- 
able right of deciding for herself who should vote." 

*The first measure considered by the convention was an 
ordinance to repeal the ordinance of secession passed De- 
cember 20, i860. The presidential plan, which provided, as 
one of the requisites for readmission, that the State should 

"Journal of the Convention, p. 11. The message was assailed 
unsparingly by some of the Northern newspapers. The New York 
Tribune, Sept. 20, said : " Governor Perry goes out of his way to 
exhume the Dred Scott decision for the sake of a fling at the 
Republican party. — ' They forget,' he says of that party, ' that this 
is a white man's government and intended for the white man only.' 
We may be excused for forgetting what we never knew. It is hardly 
worth while, it is hardly good policy, to couch a petition in words 
that are an insult to the party which is to grant the petition or reject 
it at its discretion. The difficulty with Governor Perry is that he 
wants to put the clock back four years. We assure him that South 
Carolina must present herself at the door of the House next Decem- 
ber with quite other words than his upon her repentant lips if she 
looks to see those doors fly open to her delegation." 



38 Early Period of Reconstruction in Soti th Carolina. [ 38 

declare secession " null and void," does not seem to have 
elicited any attention. The convention, as it appears from 
the journal, did not hesitate to adopt its own plan. The 
special committee, to whom the matter was referred, recom- 
mended that the ordinance withdrawing the State from the 
Union, " be, and the same is hereby, repealed." This was 
the only plan submitted and the committee's report was 
adopted by a majority of 105 to 3." Judging from this 
almost unanimous action of the convention, it is safe to say 
that there was still the old belief in the principle that a 
State has the right to secede, whether allowed to exercise it 
or not. The attitude of the convention on this question 
brought out the contention at the North that the State was 
" playing at the game of rebellion again." " 

The abolition of slavery was the most important measure 
that came before the convention. A spirited discussion arose 
when the special committee to which the question was re- 
ferred made its report. The members, with few exceptions, 
were in favor of abolition, but it was on the particular 
phraseology to be embodied in the ordinance that differences 
of opinion were entertained. One of the prominent objects 
of the debate was to make it appear by the wording that the 
abolition of slavery was brought about by the action of the 
United States authorities and not by the voluntary action of 
the convention. The ordinance as originally submitted de- 

" Journal of the Convention, p. 27. 

^^ The following is an editorial in the New York Tribune, Oct. 17, 
1865 : " The repeal of the ordinance will not do. We do not de- 
mand repeal but renunciation. This is not a distinction without a 

difiference but a distinction involving fundamental principles 

Repeal implies an original right to enact; repeal repudiates no future 
power to reestablish ; repeal may be the result of new light of political 
expediency, or as Lee's surrender was, of overpowering necessity. 
But a renunciation of the right of secession — a declaration that the 
ordinance is null and void, and all the acts done in pursuance of it 
are null and void because of its original illegality — this strikes at 
the root of rebellion ; it is a distinct official and solemn repudiation 
of that fatal philosophy fathered by Calhoun, which South Carolina 

universally taught It seems to us that the convention is 

playing at this ghoulish game again. Rebellion, its birth-place in 
Charleston, having failed to save their cause, they have carried to 
Columbia and seek to preserve it there." 



39] Presidential Reconstruction. 39 

clared that the institution of slavery, having been actually 
destroyed in the State by the military forces of the United 
States, should no longer exist in South Carolina and its re- 
establishment should be forever forbidden. An amend- 
ment, designed to incorporate the simple statement that 
slavery had ceased to exist without attributing its abolition 
to any party, was offered, but failed of adoption. In addi- 
tion to the question of phraseology, Mr. Blair, of Kershaw 
District, proposed a substitute to the amendment which had 
for its main object the securing of compensation to their 
owners for the slaves liberated. The friends of the substi- 
tute claimed that slavery had been interrupted by the war 
but not abolished. The whole people, once affluent, were 
now reduced to poverty, and as a last poor remnant of their 
possessions, they desired that the institution should not be 
yielded up without some remuneration being stipulated. 
South Carolina had taken the position that she had the right 
to go out of the Union, while the United States government 
argued that she did not have it. Secession, and not slavery, 
it was claimed, was the issue of the war, and under the con- 
stitution of the United States the convention could not 
abolish slavery without allowing a recompense. 

In answer to this argument, Mr. Dawkins, the chairman 
of the special committee, proceeded to explain the basis on 
which they had reported the ordinance. It appeared to him 
that but one alternative was left for the convention to accept. 
Slavery had been abolished by the United States authorities, 
and the committee had been particular in their report to 
adopt such phraseology as would be least distasteful to the 
people of South Carolina. Nothing was expressed in the 
ordinance with reference to compensation and it was deemed 
advisable that such a provision should not be made. It 
might be unpleasant to surrender the institution, but it would 
be more unpleasant to be long subjected to military govern- 
ment where each military commander made laws for him- 
self. The only mode by which they could be relieved was 
to adopt an ordinance that slavery did not exist in the State 



40 Early Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [40 

and that hereafter it should not exist. The case did not 
admit of argument. It was their only resource and the 
sooner they gave their acceptance the better it would be for 
them thereafter." 

James L. Orr also spoke against the substitute in some- 
what the same strain. He maintained that slavery was the 
cornerstone on which the Confederacy rested. The people 
of the North were opposed to the institution. War ensued 
and the whole question was submitted to the arbitrament of 
the sword. Nothing was left to do but accept the terms 
granted, and they should not hesitate in doing so. He 
thought compensation would be awarded them for their 
slaves but did not know to what extent it would be allowed. 
It was their duty to frame their acts in a manner acceptable 
to the administration. President Johnson had interposed 
the shield of the constitution between the South and the 
radicals at the North, and they should do their part to aid 
him in his efforts to secure civil rights to the State." After 
this debate the substitute was voted down. The ordinance 
was then acted upon and voted by the convention to be in- 
serted as a clause of the constitution. It was carried by a 
majority of 98 yeas against 8 nays." 

How to deal with the negroes as laborers, after such a 
great change in their condition, was a question which the 
convention felt called upon to consider. It was thought 
that some legislation was absolutely necessary for the con- 
trol of the vast throng of ignorant blacks, so suddenly re- 
leased from servitude. With this end in view a resolution 
was adopted providing for the appointment of a committee 
of two to prepare and submit to the legislature a code for 
the regulation of labor and the protection and government 
of the colored population of the State. It was this com- 
mittee which recommended the famous " Black Code." " 



^® This debate is reported in the Courier, Sept. 22, 1865. 

^' Ibid. 

" Journal of the Convention, p. 64. 

"Ibid, p. 103. 



41 ] Presidential Reconstruction. 41 

The question of the competency of the colored race as 
witnesses was in a measure considered by the convention. 
An ordinance w^as introduced that colored persons should be 
permitted to testify in the courts of the State in all cases 
where their rights of person or property were involved. A 
lively debate followed. All were agreed on the cardinal 
point that some legislation was necessary in order to pro- 
vide for the admissibility of the testimony of the freedmen, 
but there were differences of opinion as to the mode in which 
this should be effected. The question was finally settled by 
being referred to the committee appointed to frame the code 
for the government of the colored population. 

The convention, as recommended in the governor's mes- 
sage, destroyed the parish system of representation in the 
State senate and provided for the election of the governor 
by the people. A resolution was passed endorsing the ad- 
ministration of President Johnson and pledging cooperation 
with him " in the wise measures he has inaugurated for 
securing peace and prosperity to the wdiole Union." '^ An 
ordinance was adopted which declared in full force all acts 
and resolutions passed by the General Assembly since i860, 
except such as related to slavery. Another provided for an 
election to be held October 18, for governor and members 
of the legislature. Another, in order to hasten the process 
of restoration, divided the State into four congressional 
districts."* The convention also expressed its opinion in the 
cases of Jefferson Davis and other Confederate prisoners. 
A committee was appointed to draft a memorial to the Presi- 
dent requesting executive clemency for Jefferson Davis and 
A. H. Stevens, and for Governor Magrath and George A. 
Trenholm, held as prisoners of State." 

The only references to the political privileges of the ne- 
groes were in connection with the discussion relative to the 
destruction of the parish system. An earnest eifort was 
made to apportion the 124 members of the lower house 

^Journal of the Convention, p. 130. "'Ibid., p. 174, et seq. 

** Journal of the Convention, p. 30. 



42 Early Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [42 

among the election districts according- to the number of 
" inhabitants " instead of " white inhabitants." In defend- 
ing this position, a friend of the amendment said : " You 
have just destroyed, by overthrowing the parish system, 
what was deemed an unjust representation in the senate of 
this State, and I trust you are not about to estabhsh a still 
more odious discrimination in the assembly. With what 
kind of consistency can you approach Congress with four 
representatives, two of whom are allowed you because of 
the negro population, and at the same time refuse to allow 
the very persons who give you these additional members to 
be represented in the general assembly of your State." ^ 
Upon this speech a debate followed in which negro suffrage 
was discussed at length. It was finally decided that the 
colored race was not prepared to receive political rights and 
the amendment was laid on the table by a large majority. 

In view of the approaching election, the members of the 
convention signed a paper requesting Judge Orr to become 
a candidate for governor.^ But his nomination, on account 
of the way it was made, did not meet with the approval of 
the people.^' The convention remained in session fifteen 
days and framed an instrument which met with the approval 
of the President and with general commendation in the 
State. The constitution was not submitted to the people for 
ratification, but this fact was not due to any improper motive. 
From the beginning of the State's history, it has been held 
unnecessary in South Carolina to submit a constitution to 
popular vote. The theory is that a convention, when assem- 
bled, is the sovereign people, and not merely the agent of the 
people. Its acts are absolute and remain in force until re- 
pealed by another convention."" 



^ Courier, Sept. 25, 1865. " Courier, Sept. 28, 1865. 

'= Ibid., Oct. 3, 1865. 

^ The constitution of 1777 was framed by the General Provincial 
Congress and put into force without ratification. So also was that 
of 1790. Nor was the popular approval asked on the ordinances of 
nullification and secession, both of which, passed by conventions, 
were repealed by conventions. Even the constitution of 1895, framed 



43] Presidential Reconstruction. 43 

The short interval of time between the adjournment of 
the convention and the election of governor and members of 
the general assembly gave little opportunity for a canvass 
of the State. However, there seem to have been no issues 
before the people except a desire to have representatives 
elected to Congress who would be acceptable to the Presi- 
dent and the conservative party at the North. Considerable 
interest was felt in the gubernatorial race, due to the fact 
that many were displeased at the action of the convention in 
nominating Judge Orr without having authority to do so. 
This faction started a movement to elect General Hampton, 
the well known and very popular Confederate cavalry 
leader."" He was nominated in the Columbia newspapers 
and, although he declared that he would not be a candidate, 
was voted for all over the State. It was the general opinion 
after the election that Hampton had been chosen over Orr, 
but the official count showed that of the 18,885 votes cast 
Orr had received a small majority. 

Shortly after the adjournment of the convention Governor 
Perry wrote to Secretary Seward, enclosing a copy of the 
new constitution, and inquiring when his functions as pro- 
visional governor ceased. In reply Seward congratulated 
him on the favorable aspect of events in South Carolina 
and stated that he was to continue in the exercise of his 
duties until relieved by express orders. 

The legislature met in extra session October 28, and elec- 
ted Governor Perry and ex-Governor Manning to the 
United States Senate. An early day was also fixed for the 

at a time when there was no need for haste and no doubt of adop- 
tion, was not submitted to the people for ratification. The single 
departure from this policy was the ratification of the constitution of 
1868, which was framed and inaugurated largely by Northern men, 
who held ratification to be necessary. Constitution of 1777, p. 23 ; 
Journal of the Convention of the People of South Carolina, p. 46, 
et seq. See also Woodrow Wilson's The State, p. 477. 

" Courier, Oct, 1865. The popularity of Gen. Hampton was not 
well received by some of the Northern newspapers. Said the editor 
of the New York Tribune, Nov. 15, 1865: "The rebels almost 
forced Wade Hampton into the gubernatorial chair, merely because 
such action would be a defiance to the President." 



44 Early Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [44 

election of congressmen. During the session a telegram 
was received by Perry from the President urging the adop- 
tion of the Federal constitutional amendment abolishing 
slavery, and adding that he hoped South Carolina would not 
" lose all she had done and so well done," ^ Governor Perry 
wrote him that there was no objection to the amendment 
except the second section, which might be construed as giv- 
ing Congress the power to legislate for the freedmen. Secre- 
tary Seward replied that the second section did not enlarge, 
but restrained, the power under the first section. The cor- 
respondence was laid before the general assembly and on 
November 13 the amendment was ratified by a large major- 
ity.^ As the meeting of Congress was so near at hand, and 
as the commissions of the members had to be signed by the 
constitutional governor, it was decided to have the governor- 
elect inaugurated as soon as possible. Accordingly, on 
November 28, the ceremony took place. After this, all 
communications from the provisional governor were made 
through Governor Orr. 

President Johnson's proclamation appointing a provisional 
governor for South Carolina enjoined the military com- 
mander of the department from hindering the loyal people 
of the State from the organization of a government. When 
Governor Perry entered upon his duties. General Q. A. Gil- 
more was in command of the South Carolina department 
and had troops stationed in the various towns of the State. 
In compliance with the President's directions Gilmore issued 
an order that all officers under his authority should assist 
the governor in carrying out the objects of his reconstruc- 
tion proclamation. Nothing happened to disturb the har- 

'* House Journal, extra session, 1865, p. 68. 

^ House Journal, extra session, 1865, p. 92. On the ratification of 
the amendment the New York Tribune made this pertinent obser- 
vation : " As for the constitutional amendment, it comes by com- 
pulsion. South Carolina will vote for it now that she may kick open 
the door of Congress and stand before the Speaker's chair with six 
votes in her hand — six votes to our shame be it spoken, that repre- 
sent a power as great as Connecticut, with 8000 white men less." 
Tribune, Nov. 15, 1865. 



45] Presidential Reconstruction. 45 

mony between the military authorities and the provisional 
governor until, in order to facilitate the election of conven- 
tion delegates, Perry ordered magistrates to administer the 
oath of allegiance. This assumption of power w^as displeas- 
ing to the sub-commanders, who overruled the order in 
express terms. Perry wrote to the President and the secre- 
tary of state, complaining of the action of the military 
authorities and stating that, if magistrates were not empow- 
ered to administer the oath, in many parts of the State the 
people would be deprived of voting, as the number of pro- 
vost-marshals on duty in South Carolina was not sufficient 
to cover the State. They both telegraphed their approval 
of the provisional governor's course, and ordered the mili- 
tary authorities not to interfere further in the matter.'" 

Other complaints were lodged against the provost-mar- 
shals. In an interview with General Gilmore, Perry repre- 
sented that the provost courts were taking jurisdiction in all 
manner of cases and that their decisions were flagrantly in 
conflict with law, justice and honesty. Their assumption of 
authority after the restoration of civil government, he said, 
was arbitrary and illegal. A consultation was held with 
General Meade, commanding the Department of the South, 
and the matter was settled by an agreement that in all cases 
relative to freedmen and persons of color the provost courts 
should have exclusive jurisdiction. It was further agreed 
that the civil courts should be opened under the provisional 
government and that the civil and municipal officers should 
be allowed to resume their official duties without interference 
from the military authorities." 

According to a number of accounts, the conduct of the 
colored troops was by no means calculated to increase re- 
spect for the Federal military service. Numerous reports 
of their atrocious acts are given. At Anderson it was said 
that they protected and carried off a negro who had mur- 
dered a white man. At Pocotaligo they were declared to 

'"* Perry's Reminiscences, second series, p. 270. 
" Appleton, 1865, p. 758. 



46 Early Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [46 

have gone to the house of a white man and, after tying him, 
violated the women. Perhaps the most notorious occur- 
rence of this kind was at Newberry, where Calvin Crozier, 
a young ex-Confederate, was executed summarily by order 
of the commander of the military post for resisting the in- 
trusion of a negro soldier upon some ladies."^ Besides these 
criminal acts, the colored troops were charged with demor- 
alizing the negroes and poisoning their minds with preju- 
dice against the whites and with false hopes of land grants.^ 
Such conduct caused great uneasiness among the whites, 
who had been disarmed by military order,^^ and Perry be- 
came very diligent in his efforts to have the colored troops 
removed. He wrote Secretary Seward, detailing their mis- 
conduct, and predicting that if they were not taken away a 
race conflict would arise.^° Seward at first replied that the 
colored as well as the white soldiers were soldiers of the 
United States, and that in the assignment no discrimination 
founded upon color could be made by the government.^' 
But after continued appeals the President acquiesced, and 
Perry was able to announce to the convention that the negro 
troops had been finally withdrawn from the interior of the 
State and placed in garrisons on the coast where they could 
do no further mischief." 



^" The particulars of this affair were these : Crozier was travelling 
on the train with some ladies. Some colored troops entered the 
train at Newberry and one of them, Mills, began to embrace the 
white ladies. A struggle ensued and Mills was stabbed, but not 
mortally. Crozier was arrested, although it is said there was no 
evidence against him, and ordered shot by Col. Trowbridge in thirty 
minutes. Related in the New York Tribune, May 7, 1866. 

^ The following is an extract from a letter by the special corres- 
pondent of the New York World, July 6, 1865 : " To cap the climax, 
bodies of half-trained negro troops are now being despatched to the 
various court house towns of the state to spread discontent and 
trouble among the freedmen everywhere. There are already alarm- 
ing signs of the effect of this infamous policy To station 

regiments of these freedmen, who have little of the true soldier 
about them save the arms and the uniform, in the midst of unarmed 
communities, is to jeopardize most shamefully and needlessly the 
lives of thousands." 

'^Ibid. ^°S. Doc, 1st sess. 39th Cong., No. 26, p. 119. 

^* Ibid., p. 116. "Journal of the Convention, p. 19. 



47] Presidential Reconstruction. 47 

During the latter part of his administration Governor 
Perry ordered the formation of miHtia companies to aid in 
keeping the peace. These companies were to act in concert 
with the Federal troops as a general police force, receiving 
their orders from the Federal sub-commanders at the differ- 
ent posts. In almost every district companies were formed 
and had great influence in quieting the negroes and reliev- 
ing the apprehensions of the people.'* 

Mention has already been made in another connection of 
an agreement between Governor Perry and the military 
authorities that in all cases where colored persons were con- 
cerned the military tribunals were to have exclusive juris- 
diction. This arrangement was to stand until the legislature 
should have met and passed a law allowing the negroes to 
give testimony in the courts. As civil rights were to be 
extended to the colored man along with his freedom steps 
were immediately taken, after the governmental machinery 
was put in operation, to define the status of the negroes in 
their new condition. The sentiment displayed toward the 
emancipated slaves does not seem, from the published ac- 
counts, to have been prompted by any spirit of revenge on 
the part of the whites. Indeed, it may be said that to some 
extent the white population felt a responsibility for the pro- 
tection of the freedmen in their ignorance and destitution. 
This is shown in Governor Perry's first message to the legis- 
lature. He said : " The negro has lost the protection of his 
master and he must now be protected by the law. This is 
expected of you by the President and Federal Congress and 
will remove all pretense for military rule in the State as well 
as facilitate your speedy restoration to the Union and self- 
government. The negro is innocent of all that he has gained 
and all that you have lost and he is entitled to your sympathy 
and kindness, your guidance and protection." 

The commission, authorized by the convention and ap- 
pointed by the provisional governor to prepare and submit 

" Perry's Reminiscences, second series, p. 285. 



48 Early Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [48 

to the legislature a code for the regulation of labor and the 
protection and government of the colored people, made its 
report on October 25. The members of the commission 
were Judge Wardlaw and Armistead Burt, of Abbeville, 
two of the ablest lawyers in the State. They submitted four 
bills, viz. : 

(i) A bill preliminary to the legislation induced by the 
emancipation of slaves. 

(2) A bill to establish and regulate the domestic relations 
of persons of color, and to amend the law in relation to 
paupers, vagrancy, and bastardy. 

(3) A bill to establish district courts. 

(4) A bill to amend the criminal law. 

The first bill, as its title shows, was preliminary to the 
second. It defined persons of color to be all free negroes, 
mulattoes, mestizoes, freedmen, and freedwomen and their 
descendants through either sex. Persons of color, although 
not entitled to social and political equality with white per- 
sons, were to have the right to acquire, own and dispose of 
property; to make contracts; to enjoy the fruits of their 
labor ; to sue and be sued ; and to receive protection under 
the law in their persons and property. All rights and reme- 
dies respecting person or property, which applied to white 
persons, were to be extended to persons of color, subject to 
the modifications of the next act. 

The part of the second bill regulating the domestic rela- 
tions of persons of color, recognized the right of negroes to 
marry, except that females under eighteen years and males 
under twenty-one years of age were declared incompetent 
to marry. Cohabitation or acknowledgment by the respec- 
tive parties was declared to be evidence of the relation of 
husband and wife. The marriage of apprentices or persons 
bound to service by contract was declared to be unlawful 
until the end of the apprenticeship or term of service. The 
husband was forbidden under any pretext whatever to 
abandon his wife ; and in case he should do so, or fail to 
maintain her and his children, he was to be bound to service 



49] Presidential Reconstruction. 49 

by the district judge from year to year, and the profits of 
his labor were to be applied to the maintenance of his wife 
and children. 

To regulate the relations of master and apprentice, the 
bill provided that orphan colored children over two years 
of age, colored children of paupers, vagrants and convicts, 
and all colored children that were in danger of moral con- 
tamination, might be bound by the district judge or a magis- 
trate, until, if males, they attained the age of twenty-one 
years, and, if females, eighteen years. During the term of 
indenture, the person to whom he was bound was to teach 
the apprentice the business of husbandry or some useful 
trade, furnish him food and suitable clothing, and treat him 
with honesty and discretion. If the master habitually vio- 
lated or neglected these duties, or exposed the apprentice to 
the danger of moral contamination, upon complaint the rela- 
tion might be dissolved. The master was given authority 
to inflict moderate chastisement upon his apprentice, and to 
recapture him if he departed from his service. At the expi- 
ration of his term of service, the apprentice was to have the 
right to recover from his master a sum not exceeding sixty 
dollars. 

The provisions of the bill relating to contracts for service 
were that the hours of labor should be from sunrise to sun- 
set, and that servants should not be absent from the premises 
without the written permit of the master. If the servant 
departed from the service of his master without good cause, 
the wages due him were to be forfeited. When cause for 
the discharge of a servant arose, the master, instead of dis- 
charging him, might complain to the district judge, who was 
given the power to inflict corporal punishment if satisfied 
of the misconduct complained of. Wages due the servant 
were to be preferred to all other debts, and if not paid when 
due the contract might be rescinded. Persons of color who 
wished to pursue the trade of an artisan, mechanic, or shop- 
keeper, or any other business besides that of husbandry, had 
to procure a license by the payment of ten dollars if a male, 
4 



50 Early Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [ 50 

and three dollars if a female. These fees for licenses, to- 
gether with contract fees, were to go to help establish a 
district court fund for the maintenance of the colored pau- 
pers of each district ; and if the fund was not sufficient, a 
yearly tax of one dollar was to be imposed upon each male 
person of color between the ages of twenty-one and forty- 
five years, and on each unmarried female between the ages 
of eighteen and forty-five. 

In regard to vagrancy, the bill provided that all persons 
who had not some fixed and known place of abode and some 
reputable employment, all prostitutes, peddlers without a 
license, gamblers, idlers, keepers of disreputable houses, 
thieves, persons who did not provide proper maintenance 
for their families, persons engaged without license in any 
farce or sleight-of-hand performances, fortune-tellers, im- 
posters and drunkards, should be deemed vagrants. The 
magistrate was given power to try these cases. He was to 
have the assistance of five free-holders or the aid of another 
magistrate. Upon conviction, the defendant was to be 
hired to any owner of a farm for the term of hard labor to 
which he was sentenced. The person receiving such vagrant 
was to have all the rights for enforcing good conduct and 
diligence as had been provided in the case of master and 
servant. 

The third bill was recommended as a fulfilment of the 
constitutional provision, which directed that for each dis- 
trict in the State there should be established a district court, 
" which court shall have jurisdiction of all civil causes, 
wherein one or both of the parties are persons of color, and 
of all criminal cases wherein the accused is a person of 
color." " 

By the terms of this bill persons of color were declared 
to be competent witnesses where their rights of persons or 
property were involved.'" 

^^ Constitution of 1865, article 3, section i. 
*° Courier, Dec. 24, 1865. 



51 ] Presidential Reconstruction. 51 

As the existing laws of the State relating to the negroes 
were all based on slavery, the bill to amend the criminal 
law simply altered the provisions of the old slave code so 
as to make them fit the peculiar circumstances of the freed- 
men." 

These bills were taken up by the legislature and enacted 
into laws on the 19th and 21st of December,*^ and consti- 
tuted South Carolina's share in the " Black Code " legisla- 
tion of the United States. It would be difficult to deter- 
mine just what was the feeling of the whites in South 
Carolina towards the freedmen. The belief of the writer 
is that while there was a sharp division of sentiment, the 
prevailing attitude was not necessarily bitter." Moreover, 
the apparent severity of the vagrancy laws can be partially 
explained by the fact that the general welfare of the State 
was thought to be endangered by the suddenly acquired 
freedom of a class of very ignorant people who composed 
more than half of the population. 



"All four of these bills are found in S. Doc. No. 26, ist sess. 39th 
Cong., p. 175. 

*^ Statutes at Large of South Carolina, Vol. VI, p. 271, et seq. 

" See Perry's message, p. 47, above ; and Hampton's speech, p. 57, 
note, below. 



CHAPTER III. 

Congressional Intervention. 

The policy of restoration marked out by Lincoln and 
adopted by Johnson was based on the assumption that the 
war was fought to preserve the Union.^ With the accom- 
plishment of this object, involving as it did the emancipation 
of the slaves, which had already been effected as a war 
measure, all controversy was supposed to be at an end. 
The war had been looked upon simply as a struggle to 
crush the rebellion of a portion of the inhabitants of the 
United States and not as a conquest. The Crittenden reso- 
lution, passed by Congress in 1861, had declared that the 
object of the war was " to defend and maintain the suprem- 
acy of the constitution and to preserve the Union with all 
the dignity, equality and rights of the several States unim- 
paired." ^ The presidential view was that during the con- 
flict the relations of the States with the Union had been in- 
terrupted and that their people had been deprived of civil 
government, but that, after the rebellion had been put down, 
the Union became again " the Union as it was." Such, in 
brief, was the situation considered from the conservative 
standpoint. The States of the South, at the end of the war, 
acknowledged themselves commonwealths of the Union and 
manifested a willingness to accept the legitimate results of 



^ In a letter to Horace Greeley, written August 22, 1862, Mr. Lincoln 
said : " I would save the Union. I would save it the shortest way 
under the constitution. The sooner the national authority can be 
restored, the nearer the Union will be the ' Union as it was.' If there 
be those who would not save the Union unless they could at the 
same time destroy slavery, I do not agree with them. My paramount 
object in this struggle is to save the Union and is not either to save 
or destroy slavery." Morse's Life of Lincoln, American Statesmen, 
Vol. II, p. 107. 

^ Congressional Globe, ist sess. 37th Cong., pp. 209, 222. 



53] Congressional Intervention. 53 

their surrender. Johnson, therefore, in obedience to the con- 
stitutional mandate that every State should be guaranteed a 
republican form of government, sought without delay to 
restore the insurrectionary States to their former relations 
with the general government. Accordingly, when Congress 
met in December, 1865, regular State governments were 
fully organized at the South and the one thing necessary to 
complete restoration was the presence of the South in Con- 
gress by her chosen representatives. 

Just before the meeting of Congress the President sent 
General Grant on a tour of inspection through the Southern 
States. The purpose of the tour was to learn the feelings of 
the people toward the Federal government and to ascertain 
whether there were sufiQcient signs of " returning loyalty " 
at the South to entitle the States to representation in Con- 
gress. General Grant traveled through South Carolina and 
spent two days at Charleston. In his report to the President, 
he said : " I am satisfied that the mass of the thinking men 
at the South accept the present situation of affairs in good 
faith. . . . My observations lead me to the conclusion that 
the citizens of the Southern States are anxious to return to 
self-government within the Union as soon as possible ; . . . . 
that they are in earnest in wishing to do what they think is 
required by the government, not humiliating to them as citi- 
zens, and that if such a course were pointed out they would 
pursue it in good faith." * On the basis of this report and 
from such other information as he had received, the conclu- 
sions of the President were that the aspect of affairs at the 
South was more favorable than could well have been ex- 
pected. Hence he recommended the admission of the South- 
ern representatives to Congress, saying that there was " a 
laudable desire on the part of the Southern people to renew 
their allegiance to the government and to repair the devasta- 
tions of war by a prompt and cheerful return to peaceful 
pursuits." * 

' S. Doc, 1st sess. 39th Cong., No. 2, p. 106. *Ibid'., p. 2. 



54 Early Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [ 54 

But it was evident at the outset that Congress did not 
agree with the President and General Grant that the time 
had come to admit the Southern States to representation. 
It was contended that a simple ratification of the thirteenth 
amendment was not a sufficient proof of attachment to the 
Union. To vindicate their right to representation, the erst- 
while rebellious States should have enfranchised their col- 
ored citizens and have provided liberally for the education 
of their children. They should have repudiated in toto the 
rebel debts, and have elected loyal men to represent them in 
Congress." Hence, before allowing the Southern delegates 
to take their seats, both houses adopted a resolution appoint- 
ing a joint committee to investigate conditions in the late 
insurrectionary States and to " report whether they, or any 
of them, are entitled to be represented in either house of 
Congress." 

The plan which the committee adopted " to enquire into 
the condition of the States of the so-called Confederate 
States of America " was hardly calculated to reveal the true 
situation in the South. This is said on the ground that both 
sides should have had a hearing in a question where state- 
ments were so conflicting. The testimony relative to South 
Carolina was taken by Senator Howard, of Michigan, and 
none of the witnesses examined were citizens of the State. 
All were officers in the Freedmen's Bureau. Moreover, the 
examinations were held in Washington instead of in the 
State, where an object lesson could have been presented. 
General Rufus Saxton, assistant commissioner of the Freed- 
men's Bureau in South Carolina, was the leading witness. 
He expressed the opinion that in case the United States 
became engaged in a foreign war, South Carolinians would 
unanimously join the hostile government. Nine-tenths of 
the people of the State, he said, thoroughly hated the Fed- 
eral government and the rest he termed " so-called " loyal 
men. In answer to a question as to the feeling of the people 

" Congressional Globe, ist sess. 39th Cong., p. 2. 



55] Congressional Intervention. 55 

toward Northern men he replied that the United States uni- 
form would more Hkely expose a person to insult than to 
respect, while a man in full rebel gray could go from one end 
of the State to the other without receiving the slightest dis- 
respect. He believed there were large numbers in South 
Carolina who would consider it no greater crime to kill an 
agent of the Freedmen's Bureau than to kill a negro. The 
late master, he said, had no knowledge of the freedman — 
knew less of the negro's character than any other person. 
Hence there was no hope for the colored man except through 
the care of the United States government. A. P. Ketchum, 
adjutant for General O. O. Howard, was the next witness. 
He testified that no instance had come under his observa- 
tion of the renunciation by a South Carolinian of the doc- 
trine of the rightfulness of secession. The secessionists, he 
said, would have nothing to do with Northern men socially, 
not because they were Northern, but because they (the seces- 
sionists) acknowledged in their hearts the superiority of 
the North and the Northern mind. 

The other witnesses were J. W. Alvord, of New Jersey 
and Brigadier-General C. H. Howard, whose opinions 
agreed substantially with the views already given. The 
general nature of the inquiries related to the feeling in 
South Carolina toward the government of the United States, 
the probability that South Carolina would side with the 
enemy in case the United States became engaged in a for- 
eign war, the attitude of Southern whites toward Northern 
settlers, and the extent to which the blacks were or would 
be recognized in the courts, in the schools, and socially. 

All of the witnesses testified in a manner decidedly dam- 
aging to the Southern side of the case. It was claimed that 
the secessionists would readily join any movement for the 
destruction of the Federal government ; that, although there 
was an expressed willingness to submit to the necessities of 
the situation, the sentiment toward the Union was unani- 
mously hostile ; that the Southern whites would not scruple 
to take the life of a negro on the slightest provocation ; 



56 Early Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [ 56 

and that there were among the people very few symptoms 
of " returning loyalty." ' It will hardly be denied that, un- 
der the circumstances, the expectations of the investigating 
committee were exacting. The people of the State had ac- 
cepted the constitution of the United States as their own. 
They had abolished slavery within their own limits and had 
ratified the thirteenth amendment. They had secured to the 
freedman the right to life, liberty, and property, and ex- 
tended to him the privilege of giving testimony in the courts. 
There was everywhere abundant evidence of peace and obe- 
dience to the laws of the Union. By their industry and 
economy the people were trying to redeem their broken for- 
tunes and restore the State to prosperity and happiness.^ 
Carolinians thought this was enough to ask of them for the 
time being. Brave men who held convictions and who had 
staked their all in defence of those convictions could hardly 
have been expected to " lay down their spirit " immediately 
upon being compelled to lay down their arms. Submission 
on the field of battle is one thing ; a sudden change of long- 
cherished principles quite another. 

Moreover, it should not have been surprising to the wit- 
nesses to find that there was no wide-spread repentance 
among the former secessionists. South Carolinians could 
not see any great crime in having made an effort to live 
separate from the North. It was their right, as they thought, 
and they were not sorry for their attempted exercise of it. 
At the feet of Calhoun they had been taught that the States 
were sovereign, and even after their State had been left unto 
them desolate they could not forget the lesson. 

Nor was it reasonable to suppose that, so soon after the 
smoke of battle, an officer in the Union blue would be re- 
ceived by the people with any great degree of respect. 
Their country was devastated, their homes were burned, 
their cities and villages laid waste, and their property was 

* All the testimony relative to South Carolina is contained in the 
Report of the Joint Committee of Reconstruction, parts II and III. 
' Mercury, June 14, 1867. 



57] Congressional Intervention. 57 

taken from them : all of which woes they laid to the charge 
of the Federal armies. The sight of the Federal uniform 
served but to remind them of their present humiliation as 
compared with their once proud position. Naturally, too, 
the " rebel gray " was an object of esteem among them. It 
represented a cause very dear to their hearts. Military 
heroes in all ages have been the recipients of admiration at 
the hands of their followers, and the fact that this was true 
at the South should not have been considered strong evi- 
dence of disloyalty. Wade Hampton came very near being 
elected governor over the " so-called loyal " candidate, not 
because he was a disunionist, but because he was the State's 
greatest leader in the Confederacy and because he was de- 
servedly popular as a man. 

As to the freedmen, it is sufficient to say that there was 
no considerable feeling of unkindness in South Carolina 
toward them.' The people thought that their sudden eman- 
cipation would endanger society unless stringent laws were 
enacted to restrain them. The testimony of one of the wit- 
nesses that the late master knew less of the negro's character 
than any other person is indeed remarkable when it is con- 
sidered that master and slave had lived together all their 
lives. 

The joint committee submitted its report in June, 1866. 
They recommended for adoption, as the result of their delib- 
erations, two bills and a resolution proposing amendments 
to the constitution. 



* The following is part of an address delivered by Gen. Hampton 
at a mass meeting of freedmen in Columbia : " Last fall in an address 
to many of my old soldiers in Pickens District I touched upon the 
duty of the whites toward the colored people, and I shall read to 

you what I said on that occasion 'As a slave he was faithful 

to us ; as a freeman let us treat him as a friend. Deal with him 
frankly, justly, kindly, and my word for it he will reciprocate your 
kindness, clinging to his old home, his own country and his former 
master.' 

"Why should we not be friends? Are you not Southern men, 
as we are? Is this not your home as well as ours? Does not tlie 
glorious Southern sun above us shine alike for both of us? Did not 
this soil give birth to all of us? And will we not all alike, when 
our troubles and trials are over, sleep in that same soil on which we 
first drew breath?" Courier, March 23, 1867. 



58 Early Period of Rccoiistntcfioii in South Carolina. [58 

In arriving at a conclusion as to whether the Confederate 
States were entitled to representation in Congress, the com- 
mittee first reviewed the President's plan of reconstruction 
and defined the position which the insurrectionary States 
sustained to the Union. They recognized that it was the 
President's duty, as commander-in-chief of the army, to 
restore order, preserve property, and protect the people 
against violence in the rebellious states, where the people 
had been deprived of all civil government. But in so doing, 
the President was exercising only a military supervision, and 
his authority ceased so soon as Congress assembled. The 
provisional governors whom he had appointed possessed 
only military authority and had no power to organize civil 
governments. 

The claim for the immediate admission of senators and 
representatives from the so-called Confederate States seemed 
to the committee not to be founded either in reason or in 
law. Whether legally and constitutionally or not, they did, 
in fact, withdraw from the Union, and made themselves 
subject to another government. Having been compelled by 
utter exhaustion to lay down their arms, the conquered rebels 
were at the mercy of their conquerors. 

Granting the " profitless abstraction " that the late Con- 
federate States were still States of the Union, the committee 
contended that it did not thereby follow that those States 
might not place themselves in a condition to abrogate the 
powers and privileges incident to a State of the Union. In 
their opinion it was a mockery to contend that a people who 
had defied the authority of the Union and refused to execute 
its laws should still retain the entire right to resume all their 
privileges within the Union, to participate in its government 
and in the control of its affairs. 

In answer to the argument that taxation and representa- 
tion should go hand in hand, the committee replied that if 
the so-called Confederate States had no right to throw oflf 
the authority of the United States they were bound at all 
times to share in the burdens of the government. The people 



59] Congressional Intervention. 59 

of the insurrectionary States had no right to complain, if, 
before regaining their representation, they were compelled 
to help bear the burden of taxation incurred by their treason. 

Doubts being entertained as to whether the Federal gov- 
ernment had the power to prescribe the qualifications of 
voters in a State, the committee recommended that political 
power should be possessed in all the States exactly in pro- 
portion as the right of suffrage should be granted without 
the distinction of color or race. This plan, it was claimed, 
would still leave the whole franchise question, where it had 
always been, with the States themselves. 

The power of calling conventions and convening legisla- 
tures, which the provisional governors had exercised, did 
not belong to them. They were simply " bridging over the 
chasm between rebellion and restoration," and the conven- 
tions which they had called had no authority to change the 
fundamental laws. The President had transcended his 
authority in allowing the different State conventions to 
frame constitutions, although they were not disposed to criti- 
cize him for this assumption of power. The conventions had 
by no means met the requirements. In order to hasten the 
States' return to immediate participation in the government, 
they had simply amended constitutions which were already 
defunct. Glaring irregularities were manifest, in view of 
which and the failure to submit the constitutions to the 
people for ratification, the committee was forced to the con- 
clusion that the so-called Confederate States had not placed 
themselves in a condition to claim representation in Con- 
gress. 

It was competent for Congress to ignore the laws and 
admit the so-called Confederate States at once, but the com- 
mittee did not deem it advisable to do so till a more submis- 
sive attitude was shown. The rebels should exhibit some- 
thing more than an unwilling submission to an unavoidable 
necessity. " They should evince entire repudiation of all 
hostility " and give adequate security for future peace and 
safety. 



6o Early Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [60 

In the light of the foregoing facts the committee rendered 
the opinion that the States lately in rebellion were disorgan- 
ized communities without civil governments ; that the repre- 
sentatives from these disorganized communities could not be 
recognized by Congress as duly elected ; and that such com- 
munities should not be allowed to participate in the general 
government until Congress had provided in them such guar- 
antees as would secure the civil rights of the negroes, the 
repudiation of the rebel debt, the assumption of the Federal 
debt, the enfranchisement of the negroes, and the disfran- 
chisement of prominent Confederates/ 

The three Democratic members of the committee sub- 
mitted a minority report. Contrary to the stand taken by 
the majority, they contended that by the law and by the 
facts, the insurrection had not dissolved the Union. The 
connection between the States in rebellion and the general 
government having been undisturbed, the States were bound 
by all the obligations and entitled to all the privileges of the 
constitution. The citizens of a State might rebel and mili- 
tary power might be used — as had been the case — to put 
them down; but the illegal conduct of a portion of her 
citizens did not deprive a State of her right to be, and dis- 
solve her bonds with the Union. " A State once in the 
Union, must abide in it forever." 

The minority further charged the majority with incon- 
sistency in its recommendation of a constitutional amend- 
ment. The claim was made that the Confederate States were 
entitled to no representation in Congress and were not in 

" The members of the Committee were : 

Majority of the Committee. 

W. P. Fessenden, Maine. Thaddeus Stevens, Pennsylvania. 

James W. Grimes, Iowa. Justin S. Morrill, Vermont. 

Ira Harris, New York. John A. Bingham, Ohio. 

Jacob M. Howard, Michigan. Roscoe Conkling, New York. 

George H. Williams, Oregon. Geo. S. Boutwell, Massachusetts. 

Minority. 
Reverdy Johnson, Maryland. A. J. Rogers, New Jersey. 

Henry Grider, Kentucky. 



6i] Congressional Intervention. 6i 

the Union ; and yet there was a proposition to consult these 
States on the question of adopting an amendment to the 
Federal constitution. The States were in the Union for 
some purposes and out of it for others. 

The minority further argued that after the insurrection- 
ists had been put down the original condition of things was 
at once restored and the States were as completely mem- 
bers of the Union as they ever had been. Hence their right 
of representation in Congress was unquestionable. Over 
and above the fact that the States had not lost their character 
as members of the Union, they asserted that there was no 
internal irregularity to prohibit their representation. " We 
know that they have governments completely organized, with 
legislative, executive and judicial functions. We know that 
they are in successful operation. No one in their limits 
questions their legality, or is denied their protection. How 
they were formed, under what auspices they were formed, 
are inquiries with which Congress has no concern." 

The requirements made by the President for readmission 
and representation, said the minority, were amply sufficient, 
and were complied with satisfactorily. The terms which the 
committee proposed to offer to the South were, by the pro- 
visions of the amendment, very unjust. The South was 
given the alternative of having its representation in Con- 
gress reduced or of granting the franchise to the negroes — a 
class in a condition of almost utter ignorance. 

The Southern States could hardly be expected to ratify 
the amendment, and the effect would be to delay indefinitely 
their representation. If the committee's recommendation 
were accepted, the time-honored and constitutionally guar- 
anteed right of each State to regulate its own franchise 
would be taken away. 

The majority report of the investigating committee was 
accepted by Congress as the basis for congressional recon- 
struction. The resolution proposing what finally became the 
fourteenth amendment to the constitution was adopted and 
the amendment was submitted to the States for ratification. 



62 Early Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [62 

Doubtless the two bills recommended would have been 
passed also, had not Congress adjourned before they were 
reached. The first bill provided that the late insurrectionary 
States should ratify the proposed amendment as a condition 
precedent to being allowed representation in Congress. The 
second declared certain prominent Confederates ineligible 
to Federal office. 

The Southern States, with the exception of Tennessee, by 
an almost unanimous vote, refused to ratify the constitu- 
tional amendment. In consequence of this, when Congress 
met again in 1866, it was manifest that the radicals were 
ready to go the full length of openly denying to the States 
the right which they had always exercised of prescribing 
each for itself the qualifications for suffrage. The original 
plan of the committee had been to make it appear that this 
power was still left to the States, but when the work of 
reorganization was again resumed, all pretence to respect 
for this ancient principle was lost sight of. The final plan of 
reconstruction was embodied in an act passed March 2, 1867. 
It declared that no legal governments existed in the ten 
Confederate States, and to the end that peace and good order 
might prevail in those States until loyal and republican State 
governments might be established, the States were divided 
into five military districts and made subject to the military 
authority of the United States. North and South Carolina 
comprised the second district. It was made the duty of each 
army officer, assigned to the command of a district, to protect 
all persons in their rights and to suppress insurrection and 
disorder. The military commander might allow local civil 
tribunals to try offenders, but whenever he thought it neces- 
sary to organize military tribunals for that purpose all inter- 
ference under color of State authority was declared null. 
It was provided that the rebel States should be entitled to 
representation when they had ratified constitutions framed 
by conventions whose delegates had been elected by the male 
citizens of the States, of whatever race, color, or previous 
condition ; when such constitutions provided that all should 



63] Congressional Intervention. 63 

enjoy the elective franchise who had been electors for dele- 
gates to the conventions ; when such constitutions were rati- 
fied by popular vote and submitted to and approved by Con- 
gress ; and when the States had adopted the proposed amend- 
ment to the Federal constitution/" 

It will be observed that, by the terms of this act, the 
States were left to take the initiative in regard to their resto- 
ration, only the requirements of their readmission being 
specified. But it became apparent to the politicians that the 
Southern States might prefer to remain out of the Union 
indefinitely and be governed by the military under the con- 
trol of the President. This was exactly what the radicals 
wished to avoid (as restoration with negro suffrage might 
thereby be delayed till after the presidential election of 1868, 
and the radical party might fail of success)." Congress, 
therefore, having fortified itself against the President by 
providing that the new Congress convene immediately upon 
the adjournment of the old, proceeded to pass a supplemen- 
tary reconstruction act on March 23. This act was designed 
simply to put the first act into immediate execution and to 
deprive the States of any voice in restoration. By its pro- 
visions, the military commander of each district, defined in 
the first act, was directed to cause a registration to be made 
of the male citizens of his district of twenty-one years of age 
and upwards. This registration was to include all electors 
mentioned in the first act except those who were unable to 
take a prescribed oath. This " test oath," as it was called, 
disfranchised not only the leaders of the Confederacy and 
other prominent citizens, but large numbers of the whites 
generally, as there were few who had not given " aid and 
comfort to the rebellion." 



" U. S. Statutes at Large, Vol. XIV, p. 428. 

''The Mercury of Aug. 10, 1867, said editorially: "They admit 
that they will be defeated unless the Southern States be admitted to 
congress with Radical delegations which will support through thick 
and thin the measures of the Radical party. If the Southern States 
are not readmitted, or if they are not readmitted with Radical repre- 
sentatives, the sun of the Radical revolutionists has set forever." 



64 Early Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [64 

After the registration, the commanding- general was to 
appoint an election for delegates to a constitutional conven- 
tion. If the constitution which this convention should frame 
was ratified by a majority of the votes of the qualified elec- 
tors, and if it met the approval of the President and Con- 
gress, the State in question was then to be declared entitled 
to representation." 

These reconstruction acts meant complete negro enfran- 
chisement for the South, and — since they had to be weighed 
in the " test oath " balance — the disfranchisement of the 
whites almost as complete. 

That these acts of Congress were not " outside of the 
constitution " is a question open to argument. The claim 
set up by the extremists among the radicals was that the 
Southern States at the close of the war were conquered prov- 
inces to be treated as foreign territory and subject in all 
respects to the will of the North. But this theory was a 
contradiction to the theory which they steadily asserted, that 
the Confederacy was not a legitimate government. It also 
admitted that a nation could make war upon itself and 
denied the doctrine of the Supreme Court, as later an- 
nounced, that " this is an indestructible Union of indestruc- 
tible States." " 

The more moderate radicals took the position that the 
States had not ceased to be members of the Union, but that 
by their acts of secession and by their armed resistance to 
the Federal government, they had rendered themselves in- 
capable of exercising political privileges under the constitu- 
tion. This being the case, it was the right and duty of 
Congress, under the clause of the constitution guaranteeing 
a republican form of government to the States, to reorganize 
the State governments. 

It is the construction which Congress put upon the phrase, 
" republican form of government," which may be called into 



' Statutes at Large, Vol. XV, p. 2. 
'Texas vs. White, 22 Wall., 157. 



65] Congressional Intervention. 65 

question. The powers which were claimed under it would 
seem to be at variance with the sense in which the phrase 
was understood by the framers of the constitution. Accord- 
ing to the Federalist, this power extends no further than 
" to a guarantee of a republican form of government, which 
supposes a pre-existing government of the form which is to 
be guaranteed." " It also says that as long as " the existing 
republican forms are continued by the States they are guar- 
anteed by the Federal constitution." Certainly the Johnson 
government in South Carolina, although not precisely the 
government that existed when the constitution was adopted, 
was established on the same principles as the original State 
government. And by all former views of the question, it 
was republican. It had been established by Union men and 
by those insurrectionists who had received the executive 
pardon. Previous to the reconstruction era, each State had 
determined for itself and by itself what was to be its indi- 
vidual form of government. Whatever this happened to be, 
Congress had recognized it as republican. In Luther vs. 
Borden " the Supreme Court had interposed to decide which 
one of two rival State governments should be recognized, 
but conditions in the Southern States were different from 
what they were in Rhode Island. There were no rival gov- 
ernments at the South. 

If the Johnson governments were established after the 
liistoric fashion, Congress, following the precedent in the 
Rhode Island case, should have recognized them. In that 
case the government was respected " which has been recog- 
nized as the existing government of the State through all 
time past." However difficult it may be to define a repub- 
lican government, the truth seems clear that if the Johnson 
governments, established by representatives chosen accord- 
ing to the time-honored custom, were not republican, then 
the governments which Congress now proposed to establish 
in the States at the point of the Federal bayonet, would not 



'* The Federalist, No. 43. " Luther vs. Borden, 7 How., i. 

5 



66 Early Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [66 

be republican. Nowhere did the constitution provide that 
Congress should have the right to say who were to be the 
voters in each State. This power was reserved to the people 
of the States. At the time of the adoption of the constitu- 
tion and afterwards, each State had had different qualifica- 
tions for suffrage. In some, citizens alone were entitled to 
vote, in others, aliens upon a short residence. In others, 
again, a property qualification was required. The kind of 
political constituency in each was a matter with which Con- 
gress was thought to have nothing to do. 

The radicals showed further inconsistency in submitting 
the fourteenth amendment to the Southern States for ratifi- 
cation, while maintaining at the same time that the govern- 
ments in these States were provisional only. It would seem 
self-evident that to allow the States a voice in amending the 
constitution is to admit that their governments are valid. 
Assuredly none but duly recognized republican governments 
are competent to act in so vital a matter. Sovereignty in 
one respect implies sovereignty in all respects. Congress 
virtually took the position that the Southern States under 
the Johnson governments were competent to vote on the 
amendment, but competent to vote only one way. 

By appointment of the President, General Daniel E. 
Sickles, of New York, assumed command of the Second 
Military District, March 21, 1867, with headquarters at 
Charleston. General Sickles had been in command of the 
Federal troops in South Carolina during the previous year 
and was not a stranger to the people. His appointment 
seems to have been generally satisfactory so far as there 
could be any satisfaction under martial law. It was espe- 
cially gratifying to the people that he indicated in his policy 
a disposition to make the burdens of military government as 
light as possible." 

The duties of the military commanders were, in general, 
to preserve order and conduct registrations of voters who 

"New York Times, April i, 1867; Mercury, March 22, 1867. 



6y] Congressional Intervention. 6/ 

should participate in the restoration of civil government. 
Accordingly, General Sickles, upon assuming command, is- 
sued an order outlining the reconstruction acts and declar- 
ing his attitude toward the existing State government. 
Under the acts, great power was vested in the discretion of 
the military commanders. They had no option as to the 
enforcement of the acts, but the manner of enforcement was 
left for them to determine. Fortunately, however. Sickles 
did not disturb the civil polity of the State or disarrange its 
internal afifairs. By the terms of his order the civil authori- 
ties were continued in office and the people were admon- 
ished to respect and obey them. He invited the cooperation 
of all citizens in the preservation of peace and order, and 
urged acquiescence in the new authority to the end that 
military intervention might be made unnecessary." 

Among the first acts of Sickles' military administration 
was a division of the State into ten districts over which he 
placed sub-commanders. These post-commanders were to 
" exercise a supervision over all magistrates, sheriffs, deputy- 
sheriffs, constables and police within their commands," and 
to hold them accountable for any violation of military orders 
and the arrest of guilty parties.^* 

Early in his administration, Sickles issued his locally 
famous " Order Number lo." This was in response to a 
general appeal that some provision should be made to stay 
the execution of judgments for debts. Owing to the desti- 
tute condition of the State after the war and the almost 
total failure of the crops in 1866, efforts in this direction 
had been made on more than one occasion by the General 
Assembly, but they had been ineffectual. The order pro- 
hibited imprisonment for debt, directed sheriffs to suspend 
for twelve months the sale of all property upon execution 
on debts contracted prior to December, i860, protected ad- 
vances made for the purpose of carrying on agricultural pur- 

" Courier, April 4, 1867. 

" New York Herald, Apr. 24, 1867. 



68 Early Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [68 

suits and made non-enforceable judgments for debts con- 
tracted between December 19, i860, and May 15, 1865. By 
the same order the carrying of deadly weapons, except by 
officers and soldiers in the military service of the United 
States, was prohibited, and the punishment of crimes by 
whipping, maiming, stocks, pillory or any other corporal 
punishment was forbidden." 

Another matter that demanded Sickles' attention in re- 
gard to relief was the frequent violation of the internal 
revenue laws. It was represented that the scanty supply of 
food was diminished by large quantities of corn being con- 
sumed in distilleries operated contrary to law. The whiskey 
tax, it was said, went uncollected. Officers of the revenue 
service were frequently threatened with violence while at- 
tempting to discharge their duties. In some instances, juries 
failed to convict persons unquestionably guilty. It was 
further shown that this unlawful traffic made food dearer, 
and tended to increase poverty, disorder, and crime. Sickles 
therefore ordered that the manufacture of whiskey be pro- 
hibited in his district, and that parties found violating the 
order should be brought to trial before a military tribunal 
instead of a civil court.™ 

General Sickles' policy of continuing all civil function- 
aries in office seems not to have been departed from in many 
instances. He was able to report on July 17 that not more 
than twelve removals had been made in both the Carolinas, 
and these, he said, were for positive misconduct in office. 
However, when a vacancy occurred or the term of an officer 
expired he suspended elections and made the appointments 
himself. Thus he appointed a clerk of the court and an 
ordinary for Barnwell District, municipal officers for the 
towns of Marion and Darlington, and five magistrates in the 
district of Berkley. But, while his removals were few, 
Sickles maintained toward the civil authorities an attitude 



"Mercury, Apr. 15, 1867. 

"" Senate Documents, ist sess. 40tli Cong., No. 14, p. 69. 



69] Congressional Intervention. 69 

so threatening- as to give considerable annoyance/' He 
claimed that he would be unable to carry out the require- 
ments of the reconstruction acts unless he had the prompt 
and certain cooperation of all civil functionaries. To secure 
this cooperation, he let it be known that all officials, from 
the governor down, held their places subject to his will and 
that they would be dismissed from office whenever, in his 
judgment, dismissals were necessary for the successful exe- 
cution of the reconstruction measures. Sub-commanders 
were instructed to keep a strict watch over all civil officers 
and report any misconduct to the commanding general. 
Sheriffs, police and other like officers were required to 
execute the orders of the provost marshals and any disobe- 
dience or resistance subjected the offender to trial by mili- 
tary tribunal, and, upon conviction, to removal from office 
and punishment by fine and imprisonment. This liability of 
the civil authorities to interference caused much uncertainty 
and produced considerable disorder. Sickles won the name 
of military dictator." 

The protection of the rights of the freedmen occasionally 
demanded the attention of the military commander. He 
established a provost court at Aiken to have jurisdiction 
over any case to which a person of color was a party, except 
murder, arson and rape. This court was established on the 
ground that justice to the freedmen could not be obtained in 
the civil courts. Again he caused a steamboat captain to be 
tried by a military court and fined heavily for not allowing 
a negro woman to ride as a first-class passenger with white 
women. He also issued orders providing that negroes 
should sit on juries and ride with whites on trains. Aside 
from these protective measures, which some thought unjust, 
Sickles' dealings with the colored race were commendable. 
In an address to a meeting of freedmen at Charleston, he 
said : " It will not be necessary, nor can it be otherwise than 



"^ New York Herald, Aug. i, 1867. 
■■^- New York World, Oct. 15, 1867. 



/O Early Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [ 70 

injurious, for you to neglect your regular employments and 
associations to attend to political affairs." °' 

Perhaps the most conspicuous illustration of Sickles' dic- 
tatorial policy was his annulling a decree of the court of 
chancery relative to the distribution of some Confederate 
funds."' In the early part of 1865, a sum of money amount- 
ing to $8,797 in gold had been contributed by individuals for 
the purpose of remounting Hampton's Cavalry. This money 
had never been applied to the purpose for which it had been 
contributed and was left at the close of the war in the custody 
of the Bank of South Carolina. When suit for recovery was 
brought by the various claimants, the court decreed that the 
money should be refunded to the various contributors. By 
an order issued August 7, Sickles reversed the decree on 
the ground that the money was the property of the United 
States, under an act passed by Congress in 1861, providing 
that all property designed for use in insurrection was to be 
deemed "lawful subject of prize and capture wherever 
found." A receiver was appointed and the different claim- 
ants were called upon to surrender what had been returned 
to them.^ This action on the part of Sickles was considered 
arbitrary, since two years before the war had been declared 
at an end and since neither the Confederate government nor 
the State of South Carolina had been known in the transac- 
tion. 

The charge was frequently made ifi South Carolina that 
Sickles wished to rule as an absolute military chief."" The 
following incident would seem to indicate that + -e charge 
was not altogether without foundation. The United States 
Circuit Court at Raleigh, N. C, presided over by Chief Jus- 
tice Chase, rendered judgments against the property of cer- 
tain debtors at Wilmington. Sickles interfered to prohibit 
the execution of the process and the district attorney re- 
ported the fact to General Grant and the attorney-general. 

'^ Appleton, 1867, p. 691. 

" The order is published in the Charleston Courier of Oct. 2, 1867. 

^^ Courier, Aug. 9, 1867. " New York Times, June 7, 1867. 



yi] Congressional Intervention. 71 

Grant telegraphed Sickles to modify his " Order No. 10," 
under which the processes of the United States courts were 
obstructed. Sickles wrote in explanation that " Order No. 
10 " protected the people from summary executions for debt 
and that it gave great satisfaction to the people of North 
and South Carolina. Grant thereupon telegraphed Sickles 
that he (Grant) withdrew his order to him to modify "Order 
No. 10," thus leaving the latter in force. At this stage the 
United States marshal again attempted to execute the pro- 
cess, but was resisted by Sickles, who insisted that his order 
was supreme in the Second Military District. When the 
matter was reported to the President, he directed the district 
attorney to procure an indictment against Sickles for ob- 
structing a United States court. Sickles telegraphed Grant, 
denouncing the action of the President, and intimating that 
as commander of a military district created by act of Con- 
gress he was not amenable to a district attorney. The con- 
troversy became so sharp that the President removed Sickles 
and appointed General E. R. S. Canby in his place."" 

The people of the Second Military District considered 
themselves fortunate in having General Canby for their com- 
mander. He was a Southerner by birth — a native of Ken- 
tucky — although he received his appointment to West Point 
from Indiana. His most noticeable participation in the ac- 
tive struggle of the war was his defence of New Mexico in 
the campaign of 1862, against the Confederate forces under 
General H. H. Sibley. After the war, as commander of the 
district ^f Louisiana, he displayed a high order of adminis- 
trative ability, the wisdom and justice of his rule having 
been recognized by all concerned. His record had been 
such as to justify the belief that his administration would 
be creditable to himself and useful to the State. Comment- 
ing on Canby's appointment, the Courier said : " He is not, 
it is understood, a politician or wedded to the interests of any 
party organization. He has no other option than to enforce 

" See the New York Tribune, Aug. 28, 1867. 



^2 Early Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [72 

the reconstruction acts. It is believed that he will admin- 
ister these in a spirit of justice and liberality, without preju- 
dice or passion, and with a desire only for the general wel- 
fare and for a harmonious restoration." '^ 

Soon after assuming command Canby issued an order con- 
tinuing in force in the district all orders which had pre- 
viously been issued by Sickles.^" His administration seems 
to have been generally harmonious except that the qualifi- 
cations which he prescribed for jurors raised quite a dis- 
turbance in the courts. His order relative to the subject 
declared : " All citizens assessed for taxes and all citizens 
who have paid taxes for the current year and who are quali- 
fied and have been or may be duly registered as voters are 
qualified to serve as jurors. Any requirement of property 
qualification for jurors in addition to the qualification herein 
prescribed is hereby abrogated." ^^ Judge Aldrich, presid- 
ing over the circuit court at Edgefield, declined to obey the 
order on the ground that it conflicted with his oath of office, 
which required him, to the best of his ability, " to discharge 
the duties of his office and preserve, protect and defend the 
constitution of the State and that of the United States." 
This oath required him further, he said, in drawing juries, 
to carry into faithful execution the act of the General Assem- 
bly commonly known as the jury law, passed in 1831. Ac- 
cording to this law in South Carolina, those alone were 
qualified to serve as jurors who were qualified to vote for 
members of the legislature and who had paid the previous 
year a tax of any amount whatever on property held in their 
own right. For refusal to obey the order. Judge Aldrich 
was suspended from office and the State treasurer was or- 
dered not to pay his salary." 

There was much dissatisfaction on account of Canby's rul- 
ing in this matter. The Courier said he had substituted his 
order for the laws of the State. The objections to the order 



°* Courier, Aug. 30, 1867. ^° New York Herald, Sept. 6, 1867. 

'"Courier, Oct. 3, 1867. '' Appleton, 1867, p. 698. 



73] Congressional Intervention. 73 

were that the reconstruction acts, although they did make 
changes upon the subject of suffrage and office, made none 
in reference to the quahfications for jurors. That the order 
exckided from the jury a large mass of the intelligence of 
the white people simply on the ground of their past political 
opinions. That while it shut out from the jury box a large 
number of the white race, it opened the door wide to the 
whole of the African race, just emerged from a condition 
of slavery, many of whom were ignorant and unable to read 
and write. That in some districts it placed the colored race 
in complete control of the jury box.^^ In Beaufort, for in- 
stance, by the severity with which the reconstruction clause 
of exclusion was construed, the registered colored voters 
were over two thousand five hundred, while the whites num- 
bered but sixty-five. 

Much pressure was brought to bear upon Canby with a 
view of inducing him to modify the provisions of the order. 
Governor Orr wrote the President, protesting against the 
execution of the order and urging that it be revoked. Canby 
seems to have decided later that his action was without due 
deliberation, and modified the order materially. His con- 
duct in this particular was in marked contrast to the stub- 
bornness of General Sickles and apparently operated to his 
credit in the estimation of the people. 

Aside from registration, the foregoing is a brief account 
of military government in South Carolina under the recon- 
struction acts. It is perhaps proper to say that under the 
circumstances the administrations of Generals Sickles and 
Canby were as fair to all concerned as the times permitted. 

In addition to the duty of preserving order, the reconstruc- 
tion acts provided that each commanding general should 
cause to be made a registration of the citizens of the United 
States resident in his district and not disfranchised for par- 
ticipation in the rebellion. Accordingly, on May 8, General 
Sickles issued an order announcing that the registration 



Courier, Oct. 3, 1867. 



74 Early Period of Reconstruction in Sou th Carolina. [ 74 

would begin on the first Monday in July, and giving instruc- 
tions with regard to the manner in which the registration 
would be accomplished. His plan provided that one or more 
boards of registration, consisting of discreet and qualified 
persons, should be organized in each district or city to con- 
duct the registration and make a return to him of the lists 
of voters. The districts of the State were to be divided into 
convenient registration precincts and the boards were to 
visit the dififerent places in these precincts where eligible 
citizens might go to be registered. The boards of registra- 
tion were to remain in session at each place of meeting two 
days from sunrise to sunset. All applicants for the office 
of registrar were to be recommended by a competent Federal 
officer. Before entering upon their duties they were re- 
quired to take an oath that they had never voluntarily borne 
arms against the government of the United States ; that 
they had never given aid, countenance, counsel, or encour- 
agement to the persons engaged in armed hostility thereto, 
and that they had never sought, accepted, or attempted to 
exercise the functions of any office under any pretended 
authority hostile to the United States. Of course, this oath 
excluded practically all the intelligent native whites." 

But the work of registration did not begin at the appointed 
time, owing to the fact that Attorney-General Stanberry's 
interpretation of the reconstruction acts was at variance with 
that of General Sickles. The former contended that the 
provisions of the acts did not exclude from registration cer- 
tain classes of persons involved in the rebellion. Not until 
after the passage, July 19, of a second supplementary act 
were the registration regulations definitely prescribed. This 
act defined the proper construction of the previous acts and 
removed all doubts as to who were entitled to register." On 
August I, Sickles issued an order by which police powers 
were given to the boards and provision was made for the 
punishment of persons causing disorder at the places of 

^ S. Doc, ist sess. 39th Cong., No. 14, p. 66. 

" United States Statutes at Large, Vol. XV, p. 14. 



75] Congressional Intervention. 75 

registration. For the purpose of securing to the freedmen 
their right of registering, the order declared that if any per- 
son should suffer injury while seeking to exercise the right 
of registration, in addition to any penalty prescribed by law 
for the offence, damages should be awarded to the injured 
party against the perpetrator, and in case of default of pay- 
ment damages should be assessed against and paid by the 
town or district. If such offenses were perpetrated by white 
persons disguised as blacks in order to escape detection, that 
fact was to be considered as aggravating the offense. De- 
priving a citizen of employment on account of his having 
registered was declared to be an offence punishable by the 
post court, and entitling the injured party to damages against 
the offender. Every citizen presenting himself for registry 
was to take and subscribe an oath that he had not been dis- 
franchised for participation in any rebellion or civil war 
against the United States ; that he had never been a member 
of any State legislature or held any executive or judicial 
office in any State and afterwards engaged in insurrection 
or rebellion against the United States, or given aid or com- 
fort to the enemies thereof ; that he had never taken oath as 
a member of Congress or as an officer of the United States 
or as a member of any State legislature or as an executive 
or judicial officer of any State, to support the constitution 
of the United States, and afterwards engaged in insurrec- 
tion or rebellion against the United States, or given aid and 
comfort to the enemies thereof. Attention was called to 
the fact that the act of July 19 declared that no citizen should 
be entitled to be registered by reason of any executive pardon 
or amnesty for any act or thing which, without such pardon, 
would disqualify him for registration. Civil functionaries 
were notified that they would be removed from office if they 
used their official influence in any manner to hinder, delay, 
prevent or obstruct the due and perfect administration of the 
reconstruction acts.'" 



' The order is published in the Courier of Aug. 5, 1867. 



76 Early Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [76 

All preliminaries relative to the appointment of registrars 
and the assignment of precincts were completed by August 
5. One hundred and nine precincts were established in the 
State, and a board, consisting of one colored and two white 
registrars, was appointed to each. The work of registration 
then went steadily forward/*" The boards were required to 
make a second visit to the precincts in order to revise the 
lists secured on the first round, and to give an opportunity 
for registering to any who failed to exercise the privilege 
at the time of the first visit. 

There seems to have been much hesitation on the part of 
the whites as to whether they should participate in the restor- 
ation of the State on the basis of the reconstruction acts. 
Many, in a condition of despair, manifested very little con- 
cern about registering. A letter signed by about sixty promi- 
nent men in the State was addressed to General Hampton, 
asking his advice as to their duty " in the important matters 
soon to be submitted to the people of this State." " 

'° The unlettered blacks are said to have furnished a considerable 
fund of amusement in this new departure of registration. The 
following is an account found in the special correspondence of the 
New York Herald, Sept. 24, 1867 : " Many of our new found 
brethren, in fact nearly all of them, had no idea what registering 
meant, and as a natural consequence the most ludicrous scenes tran- 
spired. Quite a number brought along bags and baskets ' to put it 
in,' and in nearly every instance there was a great rush for fear 
we would not have registration ' enough to go round.' Some 
thought it was something to eat ; others thought it was something 
to wear ; and quite a number thought it was the distribution of 

confiscated lands under a new name All were sworn and 

several on being asked what was done when they were registered, 
said that, ' De gemblin wid de big whisker make me swar to deport 
de laws of United Souf Calina.' " 

^' Part of the letter reads as follows : " We have no intention 
to oppose the execution of any law even were it in our power ; but 
under the reconstruction acts, certain latitude of action is left us 
which entails upon us entire responsibility for all consequences 
which may flow therefrom. We believe this responsibility to be 
very grave and these consequences vital to every class of our com- 
munity, inseparably connected as are the interests of all. Re- 
cent events show that there is no longer a possibility of that entire 
harmony of action among our people for which you and we have 
heretofore hoped and striven. The views of the whole community 
are unsettled by the new aspect of affairs, and the people look 
to those who command their confidence for a course of action upon 
which all may agree who truly desire the prosperity of the State." 
Appleton, 1867, p. 696. 



c 



77] Congressional Intervention. / yy 




Hampton replied at some length, giving it aiTTTTs opinion 
that every man who could should register and vote against 
the proposed convention. He maintained that it would be 
better for the State to remain under military control than 
to give its sanction to measures " which we believe to be 
illegal, unconstitutional and ruinous." He counselled friend- 
liness and fair dealing toward the blacks, denying that they 
were in any way responsible for the condition of affairs in 
the State. If amicable relations were sustained, he said, the 
negroes would soon learn to trust the whites. He declared 
himself in favor of an impartial suffrage, and advocated a 
constitution conferring the elective franchise upon the negro 
on precisely the same terms as it was exercised by the white 
man. He thought a slight educational and property qualifi- 
cation would secure a proper adjustment of the question. 
In presenting his views on the suflfrage, Hampton announced 
that he did not wish to be understood as recognizing the right 
of Congress to prescribe the rules of citizenship in the 
States. '' The Supreme Court," he said, " has decided that 
the negro cannot be a citizen of the United States, and Con- 
gress cannot reverse that decision by an act. The States, 
however, are competent to confer citizenship on the negro 
and I think it is the part of wisdom that such action should 
be taken by the Southern States." ^^ General Hampton's 
opinion seems to have been shared by other prominent men 
in the State. Ex-Governor Perry was especially active in 
urging the people to register and vote " No convention." ^* 

^^ General Hampton's letter is printed in the Courier of Aug. 29. 

'° New York Times, May 22, 1867. On this subject the Courier 
of Aug. 6, said : " No South Carolinian, whether by birth or 
adoption, who is entitled to vote should voluntarily deprive himself 
of the right to cast it if occasion should require. He should not 
debar himself of this means of defence. How he shall use it or 
whether he shall use it is one thing. He should not, however, cast 
away his right to its e.xercise. To register can do no harm. Not 
to register may result in great injury. The former gives you the 
ballot and enables you to wield it. The latter course renders you 
at once powerless and deprives you of its exercise, however circum- 
stances may demand its aid. We should not yield to indifference or 
surrender to despair. Each one who can should at least be prepared 
to do his duty by his ballot." See also an editorial, entitled " Our 
Necessary Course," in the Mercury, March 28, 1867. 



78 Early Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [78 

The active work of registration proceeded without any 
serious interruption or tumult. By September 30 it was 
completed with the following result in the several districts : ** 

Districts. Whites. Blacks. 

Abbeville 1,722 3,352 

Anderson 1,801 1,398 

Barnwell 1,902 3,695 

Beaufort 927 6,278 

Berkeley 982 8,264 

Charleston 3,452 S,iii 

Chester 1,222 2,198 

Chesterfield 1,071 317 

Clarendon 754 i,552 

Colleton 1,370 3,870 

Darlington 1,572 2,910 

Edgefield 2,507 4,367 

Fairfield 942 2,434 

Georgetown 432 2,725 

Greenville 2,077 1,485 

Horry 1,065 466 

Kershaw 859 1,765 

Lancaster 983 881 

Laurens 1,628 2,372 

Lexington 1,480 975 

Marion 1,837 i,737 

Marlborough 961 1,207 

Newberry 1,131 2,251 

Orangeburg 1,645 3,371 

Pickens 2,075 851 

Richland 1,236 2,812 

Spartanburg 2,690 1,462 

Sumter 1,190 3,285 

Williamsburg 800 1,725 

Union 1,426 1,893 

York 2,606 2,072 

Total 46,346 78,982 

The foregoing table speaks for itself. It will be seen that 
of the thirty-one districts in the State twenty-one had negro 
majorities. In a few of the Piedmont districts, such as New- 
berry and Union, these negro majorities were doubtless due 

"This table is taken from Appleton, 1867, p. 699. 



79] Congressional Intervention. 79 

to lack of interest on the part of the whites, as the whites 
have always outnumbered the blacks in the northern portion 
of the State. But leaving out about four districts it is safe 
to say that the registration included generally the male popu- 
lation of the State over twenty-one years of age who were 
able to register. It is needless to say that there was much 
despondency among the whites. The question which had 
previously been one of theory now assumed the shape of an 
ominous reality. The whites thought that the political 
supremacy of the black race would render the State unsuit- 
able as a dwelling place for them, and many left her borders. 
After the completion of the registration General Canby 
began preparations for an election to decide upon the hold- 
ing of a constitutional convention. He issued an order an- 
nouncing that on November 19 and 20 an election would be 
held at which all registered voters might vote " For a Con- 
vention " or " Against a Convention," and for delegates to 
the convention — " in case a majority of the votes given on 
that question shall be for a convention, and in case a major- 
ity of the registered voters shall have voted on the question 
of holding such convention." Boards of registration were 
instructed to revise the registration list, and on being satis- 
fied that any person not entitled thereto had been registered, 
they were to strike the name of such person from the list. 
Judges of election were to be appointed by these boards. 
Sheriffs and other peace officers were required to be present 
at the polls during the two days of the election, and were 
made responsible for any interference with judges of elec- 
tion or other interruption of good order. Violence, or dis- 
charge from employment to prevent any person from vot- 
ing, was to be reported by the judges of election to the post 
commanders, who should cause the trial of the offender by 
military tribunal. Barrooms, saloons and places where 
liquor was sold were to be closed on election days. The 
carrying of deadly weapons at or in the vicinity of the poll- 
ing places was prohibited. Post commanders were to keep 
their troops well in hand on the days of election and be 



8o Early Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [80 

prepared to act promptly if there was any disturbance of the 
peace. The number of delegates to the convention was 
fixed at 124, to be apportioned to the districts of the State 
in the ratio of their registered voters." 

Before the day set for the election the Conservative Demo- 
cratic party of the State, represented by such men as General 
Hampton, Governor Perry, and Judge Aldrich, met in Co- 
lumbia to decide upon a course of action. The supplemental 
reconstruction act provided that if the votes cast at the elec- 
tion should be a majority of all the registered voters, a 
majority of that majority would suffice to warrant the call- 
ing of the convention. Assuming that a majority of the 
votes cast would be for the convention — the registered 
negroes outnumbered the registered whites almost two to 
one — it was seen that votes cast against the convention 
would tell in favor of it as helping to make up a majority of 
all the registered voters. Without this majority actually 
voting, whether for or against, the convention could not be 
held. The proper policy, then, for all registered voters 
who were opposed to the convention was not to vote at 
all at the election. The Conservative Democrats, desiring 
to defeat the convention, decided to advise this course, 
and it was adopted almost uniformly by the white 
people throughout the State. This was the policy of " mas- 
terly inactivity." As usual it called forth some vigorous 
comment from the Northern press.'' No action was taken 
in the matter of nominating delegates to the convention. 
Before adjourning an address was issued to the people, in 
which the whole policy of the general government was con- 

" Printed in the Courier of Aug. 18, 1867. 

*^ The New York Herald, in an editorial of Dec. 17, 1866, had this 
to say: "It is apparent that their ruling classes have setrled down 
into a dogged resolution to do nothing to help themselves into a 
readmission into Congress. They have fallen into the serious mis- 
take that if they do nothing, Congress can do nothing with them. 
But let South Carolina understand that by this policy of ' masterly 
inactivity ' she may be merged by Congress as part of a vast un- 
organized territory into the new territory of North Carolina, and 
she will be apt to realize the dangers of doing nothing to regain her 
character and to retain her boundaries as a State." 



8jJ Congressional Intervention. 8i 

demned in unmeasured terms. The closing paragraph of 
the address read : " Free negro labor, under the sudden 
emancipation policy of the government, is a disaster from 
which, under the most favorable circumstances, it will re- 
quire years to recover. Add to this the policy which the 
reconstruction acts propose to enforce and you place the 
South politically and socially under the heel of the negro ; 
these influences combined will drag to hopeless ruin the 
most prosperous community in the world. What do these 
reconstruction acts propose? Not negro equality merely, 
but negro supremacy. In the name, then, of humanity to 
both races ; in the name of citizenship under the constitu- 
tion ; in the name of a common history in the past ; in the 
name of our Anglo-Saxon race and blood ; in the name of 
the civilization of the nineteenth century ; in the name of 
magnanimity and the noble instincts of manhood ; in the 
name of God and nature, we protest against these acts as 
destructive to the peace of society, the prosperity of the 
country and the greatness and grandeur of our common 
future. The people of the South are powerless to avert the 
impending ruin. We have been overborne, and the responsi- 
bility to posteritv and to the world has passed into other 
hands." *^ 

Previous to the meeting of the Conservative Democrats, a 
convention of the Union Republicans had been held at 
Columbia. They claimed that their convention was the first 
ever held by the people of South Carolina. A considerable 
majority of the delegates were negroes, while most of the 
white delegates were officers in the Freedmen's Bureau, 
attaches of the Federal government and Northern adven- 
turers who had drifted into the State. They adopted a plat- 
form expressing their entire and cordial sanction of the 
recent action of Congress, and setting forth some of their 
leading principles on political matters. They favored a 
uniform system of free schools open to all. They con- 

^' Published in the Courier of Nov. 9, 1867. 
6 



82 Early Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [ 82 

demned the policy of President Johnson as unjust, oppres- 
sive, and intolerable, and pledged themselves not to support 
any candidate for office who would not openly endorse the 
principles adopted by the Union Republican party." 

The election to decide on the question of calling a con- 
vention was held on the 19th and 20th of November, with 
the following results : ^^ 

Registered voters in the State 125,328 

Votes cast 71,087 

For a convention j-^ig . . . .... ^ j3o| ^^^^ 

Against the convention — all vi^hites 2,081 

The above figures indicate how almost completely the 
whites ignored the election. Nearly all the votes cast were 
cast by the negroes and in favor of a convention. The one 
hundred and thirty whites who voted for the convention 
practically represented the whole white Republican vote in 
the State at the time. 



" The proceedings of the Republican convention are published in 
the Courier of July 28, and 29, 1868. 

" Appleton, 1867, p. 700. For the vote by districts, see the New 
York Tribune, Dec. 9, 1867. 



CHAPTER IV. 
The Beginnings of the " Carpet-bag Regime." 

The question of holding a convention having been decided 
by the election, the delegates from the several election dis- 
tricts of the State assembled by order of General Canby * 
at the club-house in Charleston, January 14, 1868, to frame a 
new constitution. The assembly was composed of fifty-one 
white and seventy-three negro members ; and in its per- 
sonnel, perhaps there have been amongst civilized peoples, 
few law-making bodies to be compared with it. It was 
alluded to by the newspapers by such names as the " Great 
Unlawful," the " Congo," and the " Ring-Streaked and 
Striped Negro " convention.^ An analysis of the elements 
of the convention will result in this general classification: 
(i) native whites without distinction or reputation; (2) ex- 
Federal officers; (3) adventurers in search of promotion or 
plunder; (4) negro lawyers and missionaries; (5) former 
slaves. Only twenty-three of the white delegates were bona 
fide citizens of the State. Among these were F. J. Moses, 
Jr., who as aid to Governor Pickens had helped to haul down 
the Union colors at Fort Sumter, and who afterwards be- 
came a very corrupt " scalawag " governor ; Camp, a "' moon- 
shiner " from Spartanburg, who shortly before his election 
to the convention had been " broken up " for illicit whiskey 
distilling ; T. J. Robertson, who had grown rich as a war 
speculator and who afterwards became United States sena- 
tor; C. C. Bowen, who had been accused of bribing a man 
to assassinate a Confederate officer, and tried for murder ; ' 
J. M. Rutland, who after the Brooks-Sumner episode in the 
United States Senate, made up a purse to buy a cane for 
Brooks, but afterwards became a strong unionist. Seven 

* New York Tribune, Jan. 3. t868. ' Mercury, Feb. I, 1868. 

' The Charleston Republican, Feb. 10, 1871. 



84 Early Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [84 

of the white delegates had been Confederate soldiers. The 
" carpet-bag " element was especially prominent in the con- 
vention. The most conspicuous members of this class were 
Niles G. Parker and D. H. Chamberlain, of Massachusetts, 
who afterwards held the offices of state treasurer and gover- 
nor, respectively. Other " carpet baggers " were C. P. Les- 
lie, New York, formerly in the internal revenue bureau ; G. 
Pillsbury, vice-president of the Union Leagues in the State ; 
and J. K. Jillson, whose best claim to notoriety came through 
the fact that he had married a negro woman. There were 
some able non-resident colored lawyers in the body, among 
whom may be mentioned J. J. Wright, L. S. Langley and 
W. J. Whipper. Whipper was a man of decided ability and 
was afterwards elected judge, but was not permitted to 
serve.* 

Of the one hundred and twenty-four delegates, forty- 
four were foreigners so far as the State was concerned. 
Massachusetts contributed nine delegates ; North Carolina, 
four ; Pennsylvania, two ; several other States, one each. 
There were also members of the convention who were from 
Denmark, Ireland, Dutch Guiana, and other foreign coun- 
tries." One account gives the number of preacher delegates 
as seven. The most prominent of these were R. H. Cain, 

* Sketches of the delegates to the convention are given in the 
New York Times, Jan. 23, 1868, and in the New York World, April 
10, 1868. 

'' The New York World of April 10, 1868, gives the following table 
showing the residence of the delegates : 

Whites. Negroes. 

South Carolina 23 South Carolina '. 57 

North Carolina 3 • Pennsylvania 2 

Georgia . ' i Michigan i 

Massachusetts * 7 Georgia . .- i 

Connecticut .' i Tennessee i 

Rhode Island i Ohio i 

New York ' i North Carolina \ i 

Other Northern States . •. . . 5 Virginia i 

England .- 2 Massachusetts 2 

Ireland i Dutch Guiana i 

Prussia i Unknown 5 

Denmark i — 

Unknown 4 73 

51 



85] The Bcgintiings of the " Carpet-bag Regime." 85 

colored, afterwards a member of Congress ; and B. F. 
Whittemore, white, of Massachusetts, later elected to Con- 
gress, but turned out for selling West Point cadetships. 
Fifty-seven of the seventy-three colored delegates had, three 
years before, constituted part of the slave property of South 
Carolina, and" it is needless to say that illiteracy was one of 
their chief characteristics. The most famous native negro 
in the convention was Beverly Nash, of Richland District. 
He had been a hotel porter in Columbia, but after the war 
turned his attention to oratory and soon attained political 
prominence." 

The convention was called to order by Timothy Hurley, 
of Berkeley District, who moved that T. J. Robertson be 
requested to act as temporary chairman. The motion was 
carried and Mr. Robertson, on taking the chair, made a 
short address, in the course of which he said : " It becomes 
us to frame a just and liberal constitution that will guar- 
antee equal rights to all, regardless of race, color or pre- 
vious condition. I trust there will be no class legislation 
here. I hope we will act in such a manner as will reflect 
credit upon ourselves and secure the confidence of the people 
of the State whom we represent."^ 

The chair ruled that the possession of General Canby's 
military order was sufificient evidence of membership in the 
convention, and that ninety-two members having responded 
to the roll-call, it was unnecessary to go into any further 
investigation as to credentials. 

A. G. Mackey, collector of the port at Charleston, was 
chosen president of the convention, and C. J. Stolbrand, 
secretary. These two officers were white ; the assistant 
secretary, engrossing clerk, sergeant-at-arms, doorkeeper, 
and messengers were colored. 

The same writer called attention to the significant fact that in a 
body purporting to be a South Carolina convention, but one man in 
five, or twenty-three out of one hundred and twenty-four was a 
legitimate voter of the State. 

" Nash afterwards became State Senator, and was known as a 
$5000.00 man, that is, he was said to have asked that amount for his 
vote on certain bills. 'Journal of the Convention, p. 6. 



86 Early Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [86 

•Contrary to what might have been expected, the temper 
of the convention, among the negro members especially, was 
at first very moderate. President Mackey said, upon tak- 
ing the chair, that he entertained no vindictive feelings to- 
ward those of his fellow citizens who, through the influence 
of their political leaders, had been lead to entertain erro- 
neous sentiments. He was opposed to all confiscations of 
property, and to any general disfranchisement of the masses 
of the people. If it would not endanger the safety of the 
nation he favored a general amnesty." To illustrate further 
the moderation with which the convention started off, when 
the question of electing a chaplain came up several members 
expressed themselves as strongly opposed to " digging un- 
necessarily into the State treasury." This item of expense 
was avoided altogether and the duty of chaplain was per- 
formed by the several white and colored ministers in the 
body. This economy in the use of the people's money was 
in marked contrast to the subsequent record of these same 
founders of the Republican party in South Carolina. 

Quite a lively discussion arose early in the session over a 
resolution proposing to invite Governor Orr to address the 
convention. Some opposed the resolution outright, others 
favored it only after the word " Provisional " had been 
inserted before the word Governor.' But despite the oppo- 



* Journal of the Convention, p. i6. 

• Said Beverly Nash : " I v^^ant to say, Mr. President, that I am 
opposed to the resolution inviting Governor Orr to address this 
convention. I am opposed to men of his stripe exercising the priv- 
ilege of free speech inside of the hall. We didn't come here to see 
Governor Orr make a flight like a squirrel from one tree to another. 
I remember he said to me last spring, 'better wait and find out 
whether there is going to be a failure or not; don't jine the Repub- 
lican party yet; don't jine the Democratic party.' He wanted me to 
sit on the fence with him, and when he got ready to make one of his 
flights I suppose he wanted me to follow him. No, gentlemen, I 
don't propose that Governor Orr come here to teach us ground and 
lofty tumbling. I come from a part of the country where the 
people are Republican ; from a district where the people would rather 
hear Governor Perry any time, because we know he is going to cuss 
us and abuse us every way he can; but Governor Orr! why, he tum- 
bles so fast it makes a man's head ' dizzie ' to look at him." Journal 
of the Convention, p. 33. 



87] The Beginnings of the " Carpet-bag Regime." 87 

sition, Governor Orr was invited and improved the occa- 
sion to offer the convention some very timely advice. He 
did not hesitate to say that the convention was representa- 
tive of only the colored population of South Carolina ; but 
the intelligence, wealth and refinement of the State had no 
voice in its deliberations. He therefore all the more earn- 
estly recommended wise and moderate action on the part 
of the delegates, and suggested some of the features which 
he considered most essential in the new constitution. 

He urged the removal of all political disabilities from 
the white citizens in these words : " Those of you who are 
to the manor born know the fact that very few white men 
in South Carolina abstained from some participation in the 
late war. You know further that the intelligence, wealth, 
and virtue of South Carolina entered eagerly into that war, 
and that when it is attempted to disfranchise or denounce 
these persons as unworthy of public trust, it is to exclude 
the real intelligence and experience of the State from her 
councils." 

In regard to the election franchise, he advised an educa- 
tional or property qualification, applicable to blacks and 
whites alike." 

A matter that early engaged the serious attention of the 
convention was the perfecting of ways and means for the 
payment of the per diem and mileage of the delegates. The 
reconstruction acts provided that the expenses of registra- 
tion were to be met by the Federal government, but the State 
itself was left to defray the cost of its constitutional con- 
vention. For this purpose the acts declared that the con- 
vention should levy and collect a tax, and not use the money 
of the State treasury. 

The finance committee reported a recommendation that 
the convention pledge the faith and credit of the State for 
the redemption of the $500,000 of bills receivable authorized 
by a previous act of the legislature, and that the members 

^"Journal of the Convention, p. 45. 



88 Early Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [88 

accept these bills in payment for their services." For the 
benefit of those who were not willing to be paid in State 
bills, and insisted on the immediate levy of a tax to be paid 
in greenbacks, it was pointed out that the collection of such 
a tax in a time sufficiently short to meet the needs of the 
convention was not possible. To overcome the difficulty 
under which the convention labored of not being able to 
use the money in the State treasury, the committee recom- 
mended the passage of an ordinance requesting the com- 
manding general to issue orders from time to time upon the 
treasury for the payment of such sums as might be necessary 
to defray the current expenses of the convention. The ordi- 
nance further provided that the revenue from a tax, to be 
levied and collected at a convenient time under military 
order, should be deposited in the State treasury to replace 
the advances made to the convention. This tax was to be 
laid on all real estate ; on articles manufactured for sale 
during the year 1868; on buggies, wagons, carriages, omni- 
buses, gold and silver plate, watches, jewelry and pianos; 
and on every person keeping a dog or dogs. At the different 
rates which were fixed upon these items, it was thought the 
tax would amount to $75,000, the sum estimated as necessary 
to defray the expenses of the convention. The per diem of 
the members was fixed by the ordinance at nine dollars for 
each, and the mileage at twenty cents per mile to and from 
Charleston." 

The convention was occupied a week in discussing the 
report of the finance committee. The recommendation that 
members be paid in the bills receivable of the State proved 
to be a severe strain upon the patriotism of not a few of the 
delegates, although they all asserted that they did not come 
to the convention to make a fortune. The chairman of the 
committee argued that the members should show a willing- 
ness to take the State bills, thereby enhancing their value 
and establishing the credit of the State. This appeal, how- 

" Journal of the Convention, p. 155. " Ibid., p. 154. 



89] The Beginnings of the " Carpet-hag Regime." 89 

ever, does not seem to have been very effective. There 
were those in the convention who would be paid in nothing 
but Unitd States currency, and if such currency could not 
be obtained in time by taxation, then they demanded that 
bonds be issued and sold for greenbacks. But the argument 
was advanced that if the bonds of the State were put upon 
the market they would not bring ten cents on the dollar. 
When it was found that the clamor for greenbacks was use- 
less, the members proceeded, as a last resort, to vote an 
increase from nine to eleven dollars per day in their salaries. 
The valuable time consumed and the spirit manifested in 
this debate would indicate that the delegates of the conven- 
tion were more concerned with what they were to receive 
for their services than they were in framing an instrument 
of government for the State." 

As none of the influential newspapers of the State were 
in sympathy with the convention and its objects, the need 
of an organ to uphold the Republican cause was strongly 
felt by the leaders of the new party. 

An effort was made to supply this need by electing a man 
to do the convention printing who had agreed, in the event 
of his election, to establish a Republican newspaper. The 
fact that the convention was without an organ and that the 
conservative papers manifested a spirit, if not hostile at 
least indifferent, seems to have caused some opposition to 
granting the privileges of the floor to the press represen- 
tatives. The Courier and the News seldom alluded to it 
editorially, and published simply the daily proceedings as 
furnished by the convention's reporter. But from the very 
beginning of its sessions, the convention had been the 
object of many scathing attacks by the reporters and editors 
of the Mercury, and the proceedings indicate that there was 
considerable wincing under the severe lampoons of the indi- 
vidual members." One delegate said he would not have 



" Journal of the Convention, p. 204. 

"The following are specimens of characterizations of different 
members of the convention by the Mercury in its issue of Feb. 5, 



90 Early Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [90 

been slandered as he had been by the Mercury since coming 
to the convention for five hundred dollars per day. The 
comments became so distasteful, that the reporter of the 
Mercury was openly assaulted by E, W. M. Mackey, a son 
of the president, who had gone up to Orangeburg and had 
himself elected a delegate. After this digression, a debate 
of some length occupied the attention of the convention. 
Finally, a resolution was offered by D. H. Chamberlain 
denouncing the Mercury as a scurrilous and libelous sheet, 
and excluding its editors and reporter from the convention 
hall." Although many declared that they were in favor of 
free speech and a free press, the resolution was adopted by 
an almost unanimous vote. 

Many other subjects occupied the time of the convention 
before the real work of framing a constitution was taken 
up. Thus a debate arose over the adoption of a resolution 
which denounced the former ruling class and declared that 
the safety of the government demanded the speedy removal 
of the officers of the State government." Another resolution 



and subsequently: "Joseph Crews — Is a white man well known 
to many merchants in Charleston who have had occasion to regret 
his acquaintance. 

" S. A. Swails — Is a very light mulatto with scarcely any of the 
features characteristic of the negro race. He sports a thick black 
mustache and when sober would make a good looking bandit. 

" C. P. Leslie — White, hails from Brooklyn, N. Y. Obtained money 
under false pretences. His wife in New York wrote that he had 
run off and left her in a destitute condition. . . . He expresses a 
great contempt for the negroes on all occasions and speaks sneeringly 
of his co-delegates in debate. One sable delegate threatened to 
knock him down if he called him Daddy again, but Leslie merely 
laughed at him, repeating the epithet immediately." 

^' Journal of the Convention, p. 187. 

^^ Ibid., p. 71. Later in the session, T. J. Robertson introduced a 
resolution to petition General Canby to abolish the district courts 
and dismiss the judges. His remarks in behalf of the resolution 
would seem to indicate that he was bidding for the patronage of the 
negroes. He said: "I know that most of the judges of the district 
courts elected by the legislature of 1865, are unfriendly to the 
colored people and opposed in toto to the reconstruction acts of 
Congress. Their prejudices are so bitter that it is impossible for the 
colored man to obtain justice. These courts are now in session in the 
different country districts every week, and colored persons are 
being tried, convicted and sent to the penitentiary on the most 



91 ] The Begmnings of the " Carpet-bag Regime." 91 

was introduced which recommended that the convention 
take necessary action to expunge from the vocabulary of 
South CaroHna such epithets as " negro," " nigger," and 
" yankee." 

An ordinance to annul contracts and liabilities where the 
consideration was based on the purchase of slaves, engaged 
the attention of the body for some time. Whether favoring 
or opposing the ordinance, all could agree in denouncing 
the right of property in slaves. A great deal of eloquence 
was expended by the different delegates on the punishment 
due to former slave owners. One delegate said : " A few 
years ago the popular verdict of this country was passed 
upon the slave seller and the slave buyer, and both were 
found guilty of the enormous crime of slavery. The buyer 
of the slave received his sentence, which was the loss of the 
slave, and we are now to pass sentence upon the seller. We 
propose that he shall be punished by the loss of his money." " 
Those who stood for the resolution said, " let the creditor 
take the consequences of his rebellion : " those who opposed 
it said, " let the debtor fear the penalty." Since each side 
put forth in part the same argument, viz., the impossibility 
of property in man, the question turned only on the passage 
of a law violating the obligation of contracts. This obstacle 
did not long stand out against the great moral rebuke which 
the convention felt was needed to be administered to the 
former slave owners, and the ordinance was adopted by a 
large majority." 

A subject receiving special attention was a resolution peti- 
tioning Congress to lend the State one million dollars to 
purchase lands for the colored people. This measure was 
known to be very popular among the negroes, who expected 



trivial offenses. It is upon these grounds in performance of what I 
feel to be my duty, that I have drawn a petition requesting General 
Canby to abolish the district courts of the State." The resolution 
was unanimously adopted. Journal of the Convention, p. 358. 

" Speech of R. B. Elliott, JTournal of the Convention, p. 227. 

" The vote stood, yeas 95, nays, 19. Journal of the Convention, p. 
248. 



92 Early Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [92 

that, in addition to their freedom, the government Wj^s going 
to give each of them foYty acres of land and a mule/ Those 
who spoke against the resolution openly denounced the pro- 
rhoters of the scheme as acting from political motives and 
as deceiving the colored people by raising expectations that 
could not be realized," In vain did opposition insist that 
Congress would not listen to such an appeal ; that the effect 
of such a petition would be to cause the laborer to quit his 
employer in the expectation of soon possessing a farm of his 
own. The friends of the measure, relying perhaps upon 
the generosity of Congress as displayed in the Freedmen's 
Bureau, pretended to think their request would be granted 
for the asking. " Help the colored man," became the cry. 
F. J. Moses, Jr., a candidate for Congress, in the course of 
a lengthy speech, said : " How do you propose to recon- 
struct the Union. There are a thousand ways of picking 
up the broken fragments and reconstructing a vessel, but 



" In an able speech on the question, C. P. Leslie said : " But 
that was not the real question (no money in the United States 
treasury) before the house. The real question, when practically 
stated is how far the Republican party of South Carolina will toler- 
ate demagogism. That was the question in one of its phases. Another 
phase was how much political capital could he (the owner of the 
petition, Rev. R. H. Cain, colored), make out of a measure that 
everybody and the world knew would not bring a dollar for the relief 
of the people. If the owner of the motion had, in his argument in 
support of the measure, shown that there was a reasonable probab- 
ility that the loan could be obtained if the petition passed the con- 
vention, I would not have said a word. But his argument was an 
appeal to the passions of the colored people of the State. He under- 
took to hold out to them the probabilities of their getting land and 
told them they were entitled to it, that it was just they should 
have it. He saw among the crowd of spectators behind the railing 
the artisans, the working men ; he saw the laborers and farmers and 
he appealed to them and their passions, and not to the good sense of 
the house. It then became clear to my mind that the member from 
Charleston (Rev. R. H. Cain), from the way he handled the subject, 
proposed to make political capital for himself, and had he not taken 
that course I would not have said a word. I am sorry to see that a 
delegate from Charleston, who stands so well, so high in the com- 
munity both for respectability and honor, whose motto is to do right 
' though the heavens fall,' a man so intelligent as he is, offer a reso- 
lution or petition upon which he knew not one dollar could be 
obtained, and that it was offered only for political effect." Journal 
of the Convention, p. 389. 



93] The Beginnings of the " Carpet-hag Regime." 93 

how do we propose to do it? Do we propose to build it 
up on a solid foundation, that shall resist the storms of ages ; 
or do we expect to patch up here and there, to build up with 
men not devoted to the government whom the government 
has merely freed to put in a worse condition than before? 
There is but one way of making a man love his country : 
I love my country town, I love the house I live in, the land 
I live on, the sand I walk on ; because in that sand, in that 
house, in that town, I have an interest. I have an interest 
in the wealth and prosperity of the State. You cannot make 
citizens out of these people unless you give them those things 
which make men citizens. I say you must bind them to the 
government with ties that cannot be broken. Give them 
land ; give them houses. They deserve it from the people 
of South Carolina. They deserve it for protecting the fami- 
lies of those who were away from their homes during the 
late war." "" Other speakers followed in the same strain. 
" Let the large estates of the whites be divided," said F. L. 
Cardozo, " and the poor colored people will have a better 
opportunity of buying lands." ^ 

The debates on this question were very bitter and of a 
nature calculated to arouse the prejudice of the negroes 
against the whites. The charge was common that the whites 
received more aid from the Bureau than the blacks and that 
the negro had a right to share the white man's lands. It 



""Journal of the Convention, p. 433. 

" Ibid., p. 405. In the same connection R. H. Cain said : " After 
fifty men have gone on a plantation, worked the whole year at rais- 
ing twenty thousand bushels of rice, and then go to get their one- 
third, by the time they get through the division, after having been 
charged by the landlord twenty-five or thirty cents a pound for bacon, 
two or three dollars for a pair of brogans that cost sixty cents, for 
living that cost a mere song, two dollars a bushel for corn that can 
be bought for one dollar ; after, I say, these people have worked 
the whole season, and at the end make up their account, they 
find themselves in debt. The planters sell their cotton, for it is 
said that the negro has not brains enough to sell his own cotton. 
He can raise anything; he can dig ditches, pick cotton, but has not 
the sense to sell it. I deprecate that idea. I would rather see these 
people have little cottages and farms for themselves." Journal of 
Convention, p. 423. 



94 Early Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [94 

was charged that this electioneering scheme of arraying the 
negroes against the whites was regularly adopted as a part 
of the political tactics of the Republican party in South 
Carolina. The blacks, peaceable when let alone, were easily 
influenced by the politicians, who cared naught for the wel- 
fare of the State or of the negro, except as he ministered 
to their aggrandizement.''^ 

Two topics which demanded perhaps the largest amount 
of attention of any treated by the convention were, first, a 
resolution petitioning General Canby for a temporary stay 
of sales on execution for a period of three months, and, 
second, the passage of a " stay law " to be effective after the 
ratification. The leading supporters of the first measure 
were R. C. DeLarge, W. J. Whipper, and F. J. Moses, Jr. ; 
T. J. Robertson, R. H. Cain, and F. L. Cardozo were the 
principal opponents. The debate on the resolution was char- 
acterized by much bitterness and many personal allusions. 
T. J. Robertson said : " I for one am willing to see the 
property of the country, if necessary, change hands, and if 
lands are sold cheap, so much the better for the working 
man. The men asking relief, with but few exceptions, are 
those who do not recognize the validity of the reconstruc- 
tion acts of Congress. Some of them call this convention a 
menagerie, a collection of wild animals. Is this menagerie 
to protect their property at the expense of the legal citizens 
and the working men of the country, or are we to obey the 
laws which recosfnize no such measures ? " ^ But the de- 



^ In order to make such measures as these appear more ridiculous, 
one white delegate offered the following: "Resolved, That of one 
blood are made all the nations of the earth ; that the poor shall be 
always with us ; that the hungry shall always need food ; the naked 
clothing; the landless, land; the homeless, homes; the moneyless, 
money; in fine, that all future legislation shall be for the interests of 
humanity, for justice and protection to the poor, for justice and 
security to the rich." Mercury, Feb. i, 1868. 

^ Journal of the Convention, p. 106. R. H. Cain was equally 
as vindictive. Extracts from his speech are as follows : " The right 
of the poor man is equally as sacred to the convention or the 
commanding general as the right of the rich man. The large land- 
holders have been for years the recipients of all the benefits from 



95] The Beginnings of the " Carpet-hag Regime." 95 

fenders of the resolution were equally zealous. They ac- 
cused the opposition with trying to defend the measure for 
purely personal motives and with a view to filling their own 
coffers. They said that the harangues in the interest of the 
poor man were simply for effect, and denied that any further 
impoverishment of the rebels would result in good to any 
class. 

Whipper, who made the ablest speech that was delivered 
in behalf of the resolution, said : " I hope there is not a man 
in this body, whatever may be his course, who will suffer 
himself to be swayed by passion or prejudice. I hope what- 
ever you do here you will do it feeling that it is for the good 
and for the best interest of the people you represent. I hope 
it will not be done as a measure of punishment to a people 
already punished too severely. Whatever you do, above all 
do I hope it will not be done for the purpose of revenge." ^ 

After a four days' debate, the resolution passed the con- 
vention by a majority of five." 

The second measure of relief, known as the " stay law," 
provoked a discussion similar in its nature to that which was 
brought out by the resolution just mentioned. It was long 
under consideration and was not adopted until the last day 
of the session. It provided that execution on judgments 
already rendered should be for only one-tenth of the amount 
due, and that other executions for proportional amounts 

these lands. They entered heart and soul into all acts of rebellion. 
They have made their money; they have amplified their domains by 
virtue of speculations in lands. They are that very class of men 
who have been standing out against the government, against the 
constitution. These men have sacrificed money and time to defeat 
the assembling of this convention. Ought they not, therefore, to 
be compelled to pay their honest debts. They run out into the great 
sea of speculation, they run the hazard of the die and should take 
the consequences. I am for the well being of the State but I do 
not believe that in the passage of such an act the poor man will be 
benefitted. I believe it will result only to the benefit of those who 
have their large, broad acres, the rich and the luxuriant, who once 
rode in their carriages, who made the war which has brought them 
to destruction." 

^ Journal of the Convention, p. 129. 

"* Ibid., p. 148. 



96 Early Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [96 

should be issued, from year to year till 1872, when the law 
would become inoperative. 

The qualifications of electors was, of course, the vital 
question before the convention. The committee on franchise 
and elections recommended that every male citizen of the 
United States of the age of twenty-one years and upwards, 
without distinction of race, color, or former condition, who 
had been a resident of the State for one year should be 
entitled to the franchise ; " Provided, that every person com- 
ing of age after the year 1875, to be entitled to the privilege 
of an elector, shall be able to read and write ; provided, fur- 
ther, that no person shall be allowed to vote or hold office 
who is now or hereafter may be disqualified therefor by the 
constitution of the United States, until such disqualification 
shall be remedied by the Congress of the United States ; but 
the General Assembly shall have power to remove such dis- 
ability by a two-thirds vote." "' But this effort to incorpor- 
ate an educational qualification, effective after 1875, failed 
by a vote of 107 to 2," and a section was inserted in the 
franchise article, which forever prohibited the passage of 
any law depriving citizens of the right of suffrage.^ The 
severity of the second proviso was increased by the clause 
being stricken out which gave the General Assembly the 
power to remove the political disabilities of the whites. 
Thus the right of manhood suffrage was extended uni- 
versally to the colored race, while the restrictions under 
which the whites were already placed were left unchanged. 
The result of this action was, of course, to leave the State 
entirely in the control of the negroes. 

Another important clause in the constitution provided that 
all the public schools, colleges, and universities of the State 
should be open to all of the children and youth of the State 
regardless of race or color.^' 

The insertion of a clause in the constitution providing 
for a homestead law was one of the chief features of the 



^* Journal of the Convention, p. 824. ^ Ibid., p. 834. 

=' Ibid., p. 839. ^ Ibid., p. 889. 



97] The Beginnings of the " Carpet-bag Regime." 97 

session. The section containing the law first called for a 
homestead exemption of one hundred acres of land in the 
country, or town property to the value of two thousand 
dollars.'" There seemed to be none who opposed the law in 
principle, the only difficulties being to decide on the amount 
to be exempted from execution and whether or not the law 
was to be retroactive in its operations. This latter diffi- 
culty, however, did not trouble any but a few of the wealthy 
delegates. T. J. Robertson offered an amendment that no 
homestead should be exempt from levy for any just debt 
existing " prior to the passage of this constitution." He 
claimed to favor the law as applied to the future but con- 
tended that to exempt property already involved would be 
to pass an ex post facto law, which they had no authority 
to do.'^ But the convention did not favor this amendment, 
and the section passed as it was first reported. The debate 
on this measure was unusually prolonged and was char- 
acterized by a great display of oratory .'' 

Several noteworthy ordinances, besides those already men- 
tioned, were passed. One repealed " all acts and pretended 
acts " of the legislature, passed since i860, which pledged 
the faith and credit of the State for the benefit of any cor- 
porate body.^' Another provided that at an election to be 
held April 14, the constitution should be submitted for rati- 
fication, and that at the same time an election should be held 
for members of the legislature, governor, and other State 
officers. Others provided for the organization of the General 
Assembly and inauguration of the governor on May 12, for 
the ratification of the fourteenth amendment to the Federal 
constitution, and for the election by the General Assembly 
of two United States senators." Also, a resolution was 



'" Journal of the Convention, p. 452. 

'' Mercury of Feb. 10, 1868. 

'^The Journal, p. 476, contains the following: "Here Mr. Leslie 
was so overcome by his feelings as to burst into tears and sat 
down amidst intense silence, having evidently enlisted the warmest 
sympathies of the members of the convention." 

^^ Journal of the Convention, p. 872. " Ibid., p. 904. 



98 Early Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [98 

adopted petitioning Congress to remove all political disa- 
bilities from the citizens of the State. 

The convention adjourned on March 17, having been in 
session fifty-three days. 

On March 13, General Canby announced that the conven- 
tion had framed a constitution and proceeded to issue an 
order for holding an election on the days fixed by the con- 
vention ordinance. This provided that all the registered 
voters of the State might vote " For Constitution " or 
" Against Constitution," and also " on the same ballot for 
the State officers and members of the House of Representa- 
tives specified in the aforesaid ordinance." The boards of 
registration were instructed to revise, for a period of five 
days, the registration lists, and upon being satisfied that any 
person not entitled thereto had been registered, to strike the 
name of such person from the lists. The names of all per- 
sons who possessed the qualifications required by the acts 
and who had not already been registered, were to be added 
to the lists. In deciding who were to be stricken from the 
lists, the attention of the boards was especially directed to 
the supplementary reconstruction act of July 19, 1867. In 
order to secure a full vote at the election, it was ordered that 
a voter who had resided in a district for ten days might vote 
upon presentation of his registration certificate, or upon his 
affidavit that he had not already voted during the election. 
All judges and clerks employed in the election were required 
to " take and subscribe the oath of office prescribed by the 
law for officers of the United States." No member of the 
board of registration who was a candidate for office was 
allowed to serve as a judge or manager of election. The 
same regulations were laid down for the preservation of 
order as were prescribed for the election to decide upon the 
holding of the constitutional convention.'" 

Ten days later Canby issued another order, giving further 
details regarding the revision of the registration lists and 
the conduct of the election. Civil officers were instructed 

^^ The order is printed in the Courier of March 16, 1868. 



99] The Beginnings of the " Carpet-hag Regime." 99 

to render such services as were required in posting and serv- 
ing notices. Registrars, by becoming candidates for office, 
were not to be disqualified for continuing to act as registrars. 
Wherever vacancies occurred in the registration boards, the 
post comanders were to fill them and report their action 
promptly to the commanding general.^" 

On information received from different sections of the 
State and from members of both political parties that com- 
binations had been formed to prevent, delay, or hinder per- 
sons from exercising their rights at the coming election. 
General Canby issued another order on April 6, giving 
warning that any attempt to interfere with the election would 
make the offenders amenable to all the penalties of the law. 
If at any polling place the ballot boxes should be destroyed, 
or if the electors should be prevented by intimidation from 
voting, a new election was to be ordered for that precinct. 
To the end that election officers might be protected in the 
discharge of their duties and that voters might be protected 
in the exercise of the franchise, post commanders were 
authorized to station military commissioners at places re- 
mote from their headquarters. These commissioners were 
to have troops at their disposal and were empowered to exer- 
cise a general police authority during the election. All 
arrests made by the commissioners were to be reported to 
the commanding general for his decision as to whether the 
offenders were to be tried by a military tribunal or be 
brought before a civil court. All persons, whether in author- 
ity or not, were required to obey and execute all lawful 
orders of the military commissioners." 

From these regulations it is seen that General Canby 
spared no pains to poll the largest possible strength of the 
registered voters. In this regard, at least, he enforced the 
reconstruction acts to the very letter and by every means at 
his command. The bitterest radical could not have found 
reason to complain of his methods. 



Courier, March 24, 1868. 
Ibid., April 7. 



;t.ofC. 



loo Early Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [ loo 

Some time before the adjournment, the members of the 
constitutional convention resolved themselves into a Repub- 
lican nominating body and placed candidates before the 
people for the State offices. With one exception the nomi- 
nations were made from the delegates to the convention, 
T. J. Robertson and General R. K. Scott were the can- 
didates for the gubernatorial nomination. Scott was chosen, 
and, his nomination being endorsed by Robertson, the con- 
vention adopted a resolution pledging their support to Rob- 
ertson for the position of United States senator. General 
Scott was a native of Ohio, and was, at the time of his 
nomination, assistant commissioner of the Freedmen's Bu- 
reau in the State. The other nominations were: for lieu- 
tenant governor, Lemuel Boozer; for state treasurer, N. G. 
Parker, from Massachusetts ; for comptroller general, J. J. 
Neagle, from New York; for secretary of state, F. L. Car- 
dozo, colored ; for adjutant and inspector general, F. J. 
Moses, Jr. ; for attorney general, D. H. Chamberlain, from 
Massachusetts. 

These nominations illustrated how completely the new 
party was in the control of the outsiders or " carpet baggers." 
The native negroes came in for no share of the offices, and 
even the so-called white " scalawags " were not to be pre- 
ferred before Northern men. 

The convention nominated delegates to the national Re- 
publican convention, declared General Ulysses S. Grant their 
unanimous choice for president, and after singing " Rally 
Round the Flag " adjourned sine dte.^" 

The Democratic convention assembled at Columbia April 
3, and adopted a series of resolutions representing the views 
of their party. They professed their allegiance to and co- 
operation with the national Democratic party, " a party faith- 
ful to the principles of the Federal constitution as maintained 
by the fathers of the republic." All men prepared to act 
with the party were earnestly invited to form Democratic 
clubs in every section of the State. The people were urged 

^ The proceedings of the Republican convention are published in 
the Courier of March 12, 1868. 



loi] The Beginnings of the "Carpet-bag Regime." loi 

to go to the polls and vote against the constitution of the 
radical faction, and to vote for good and true men for all 
offices within their gift. " At the same time, in voting for 
officers under the constitution, we would put on record our 
protest against its validity." To encourage the negroes, the 
delegates declared their willingness to grant them, under 
proper qualifications as to property and intelligence, the right 
of suffrage. 

After adopting a platform, the convention proceeded to 
nominate State officers, congressmen, and delegates to the 
national Democratic convention. Two addresses were also 
issued, one to the conservatives of the State and one to the 
colored people.'' 

^^The address to the colored people is printed in the Courier of 
April 6. An extract from it is as follows : " Your present power 
must surely and soon pass from you. Nothing that it builds will 
stand and nothing will remain of it but the prejudices it may 
create. It is therefore a most dangerous tool that you are handling. 
Your leaders, both white and black, are using your votes for 
nothing but their individual gain. Many of them you have only 
known heretofore to despise and mistrust, until your leagues com- 
manded you to vote for them. Offices and salaries for themselves 
are the heights of their ambitions ; and so that they make hay while 
the sun shines, they care not who is caught in the storm that 
follows. Already they have driven away all capital and credit from 
the South. What few enterprises are carried on are only the work 
of Southern men, who have faith that the present state of affairs is 
but temporary. The world does not offer better opportunities for 
the employment of capital than are found here, but will your radical 
friends send their money here to invest? Not one dollar. They 
would just as soon venture an investment in Hayti or Liberia as 
commit their money to the influence of your legislation. Capital has 

learned to shun it as a deadly plague We do not pretend to 

be better friends to your race than we are to ourselves, and we only 
speak where we are not invited because your welfare concerns ours. 
If you destroy yourselves you injure us and we would if we could 
avert the whole danger. We are not in any condition to make you 
any promises or to propose to you any compromises. We can do 
nothing but await the course of events — but this we do without 
the slightest misgiving or apprehension for ourselves. We shall not 
give up our country and time will soon restore our control of it. 
But we earnestly caution you and beg you in the meanwhile to beware 
of the use you make of your temporary power. Remember that 
your race has nothing to gain and everything to lose, if you invoke 
that prejudice of race which, since the world was made has ever 
driven the weaker tribe to the wall. Forsake then the wicked and 
stupid men who would involve you in this folly and make to your- 
selves friends and not enemies of the white people of South 
Carolina." 



102 Early Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [102 

The address to the conservatives recited the deplorable 
condition of the State and the objections of the convention 
to the radical constitution. It urged the whites not only 
themselves to vote, but to persuade the negroes and show 
them that it was only to their interest to vote with the 
whites."" The nominee for governor was W. D. Porter, of 
Charleston ; the incumbents of the other State offices were, 
with one or two exceptions, renominated. 

Before adjourning, the convention requested Chairman 
Burt to give his opinion as a lawyer on the legality of the 
new constitution. He stated it as his earnest conviction that 
the constitution, if ratified, would be fatal to the welfare of 
both races. " I protest," said the speaker, " against that 
constitution because it seeks to destroy our past, our history 
— every landmark. No people on this continent can endure 
the burden of taxation that that constitution imposes. All 
taxation by that instrument is imposed upon real estate 
and the sale of merchandise. The taxable property is held 
by one race and the law-making power by the other. Not 
only the arduous appropriations are paid by the whites, but 
all others with the exception of a small tax for educational 
purposes. Without any qualifications whatever, one class 
is allowed to vote, while the other is disfranchised. Those 
who do not hold the property vote and make laws, while the 
property owners are not allowed to vote for even a con- 
stable. So cumbersome and conflicting are the details of 
that constitution that we will be crushed by it. The im- 
poverished people cannot bear up under it. Every antag- 
onism between the two races is incited by it. I call upon 
every white man and every colored man to unite, resist, and 
defeat that constitution by every means our oppressors per- 
mit us to use. It is a duty we owe to the living and to the 
dead." Burt's address, of which the above is only a part, 
was listened to with close attention and at its conclusion the 
thanks of the convention were tendered to the speaker. The 

*° Printed in the Mercury of Apr. 8, 1868. 



103] The Beginnings of the " Carpet-bag Regime." 103 

address was published by the executive committee as a cam- 
paign document.'^ 

The declared principles on which the Democratic party 
was organized did not give satisfaction to the entire body 
of the conservatives in the State. Some objected to the 
concession made in favor of negro suffrage. Others op- 
posed the action of the convention in nominating candidates 
for office, thereby taking it for granted that the constitution 
would be ratified. The part of wisdom, it was said, was 
for the conservatives to vote solidly against the constitution, 
which they either could or could not defeat. If they could 
defeat it the matter would end. If they could not, to enter 
into a contest for offices under it was preclusive of any 
protest against it. On this ground Porter declined the nomi- 
nation for governor. He thought it unnecessary to name 
candidates for State offices, as the conservatives could de- 
feat the constitution if they could elect their nominee. " A 
vote against the constitution satisfies our whole political 
duty," he said. As an additional reason for his action, he 
pointed out that if elected he could not qualify under the 
proposed constitution.'^ 

As the day for the election drew near, the press of the 
State and the prominent men generally became more and 
more earnest in their efforts to secure the rejection of the 
constitution. No further action was taken by the Demo- 
crats after Porter's refusal to become their candidate. It 
came to be generally recognized" that officers had been nomi- 
nated only to bring out the entire strength of the white vote. 
Hence the Democrats made no effort to elect officers but 
bent all their energies toward defeating the radical consti- 
tution. After the new act of Congress, which declared that 
a majority of those who actually voted would be sufficient 
for the ratification of the constitution, the conservatives saw 
that by pursuing their former policy of " masterly inactiv- 

" The proceedings of the convention are published in the Courier 
of Apr. 6. 

" Porter's letter declining the nomination is printed in the Courier 
of Apr. ID. 



I04 Early Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [ 104 

ity " they would simply play into the hands of the radicals. 
In a stirring appeal for the rejection of the constitution, the 
Courier of April 11, said: " Our duty is now changed. It 
is not to abstain from, but go to the polls and vote in a solid 
mass against the constitution. The call of patriotism and 
of country, of home and of fireside, are upon us. We can 
either defeat the constitution or we cannot. In either event 
our duty is the same." 

The various objections to the proposed instrument were 
urged upon the people as the campaign progressed. It was 
pointed out that the constitution would supplant intelligence 
with ignorance ; that it would force white children into con- 
tact in the schools with negro children ; that it excluded 
from the administration of the State government the men 
most fit for office, and substituted itinerant demagogues and 
men who were " strangers in the main to our soil ;" and that 
it bestowed suffrage upon those who were not qualified to 
exercise it.*' 

The election for the legislature took place at the appointed 
time without serious disturbance and resulted in an over- 
whelming victory for the radicals." Only seven of the 
thirty-three State senators were Democrats. Forty-eight of 
the one hundred and twenty-four representatives were white 
men, of which number the Democrats had only fourteen. 
The conservatives carried but five of the thirty-one counties. 
The vote on the constitution was as follows : 

Registered voters 133.597 

For the constitution 70.758 

Against the constitution 27,288 

Not voting 35,551 

*^ This is part of an editorial in the Mercury, quoted by the New 
York Tribune, March 31, 1868: "It is just as well, men of the 
North, that you should understand now as at any other time that 
the people of the Southern States do not intend to be ruled by 
negroes. If it is the purpose of the United States government to 
negroize the Southern States, they may as well know now that 
it has to be done with the bayonet and has to be preserved with the 
bayonet in all time to come. The Southern people do not intend 
to be mongrelized. They prefer the sword^ — this they can compel." 

"The election returns are given in Appleton, 1868, p. 657. 



105] The Beginnings of the " Carpet-hag Regime." 105 

That the RepubHcans would carry the State seems to have 
been considered inevitable by the whites. But the figures 
indicate that in spite of the great numerical majority of the 
negroes, the election might have been much closer than it 
was. The whites evidently had lost hope and failed to exert 
themselves. 

The constitution having been ratified, a copy of the instru- 
ment was forwarded to Congress for its approval. The 
Democrats of the State, through their executive committee, 
framed a remonstrance against it and sent a delegation to 
Washington to argue the question before the reconstruction 
committee. The remonstrance recited as objections to the 
constitution that under it the whites were disfranchised, 
that taxation and representation were no longer united, and 
that, the taxing power being held by one race and the prop- 
erty by the other, confiscation would follow. The last para- 
graph of the remonstrance closed with these words : " We 
do not mean to threaten resistance by arms, but the white 
people of our State will never quietly submit to negro rule. 
By every peaceful means left us, we will keep up this con- 
test until we have regained the heritage of political control 
handed down to us by an honored ancestry. This is a duty 
that we owe to the land that is ours, to the graves that it con- 
tains, and to the race of which you and we are alike mem- 
bers — the proud Caucasian race, whose sovereignty on earth 
God has ordained, and they themselves have illustrated on 
the most brilliant pages of the world's history." " 

The remonstrance fell upon deaf ears. It was submitted 
to the House of Representatives and there laid on the table. 

South Carolina continued under military government till 
Congress passed the " Omnibus Bill," July 25, 1868. By the 
provisions of this bill, Alabama, Florida, Georgia, North 
Carolina, South Carolina and Louisiana were to be admitted 
to representation in Congress when their legislatures had 
ratified the fourteenth amendment and upon condition that 

*• Appleton, 1868, p. 697. 



io6 Early Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [ io6 

there should afterwards be no denial or abridgement of the 
election franchise on account of color/" 

Immediately after the passage of the act Governor-elect 
Scott issued a proclamation for the convening of the legisla- 
ture on July 6/' 

The fourteenth amendment was ratified by a vote of io6 
to 12/' An election for United States senators was entered 
into forthwith and resulted in the choice of T. J. Robertson 
and F, A. Sawyer," In the meantime the South Carolina 
delegates to the national House of Representatives had been 
sworn in. By a military order of July 13, all authorities 
created under the recent congressional acts were withdrawn 
and the so-called reconstruction of the State was complete. 

"■ Statutes at Large, Vol. XV, p. 73. 

" Journal of the House of Representatives, 1868, p. 3. 

'' Ibid., 1868, p. 50. 

" Ibid., p. 81, et seq. 



CHAPTER V. 

The Freedmen's Bureau. 

The peculiar circumstances under which the Civil War 
was waged brought out certain aspects of the abolition of 
slavery which were somewhat unusual, and for which there 
was very little precedent. In the South there were two 
races living side by side whose interests in the struggle 
were exactly opposite. The Southern whites were straining 
every nerve to gain their independence of the North along 
with which it then seemed would follow the perpetuation of 
their " peculiar institution," the servility of the blacks. But, 
perhaps contrary to the expectation of the Northern people, 
the servile race, when the opportunity was presented, did 
not show the spirit of independence anticipated nor did they 
rise in insurrection against their masters, be it said to their 
credit. They did not materially aid their Northern deliv- 
erers in the cause of abolition. Certainly this was true, as 
will be seen, so far as South Carolina was concerned. 

Upon the conquest of any considerable area of Confeder- 
ate territory, the Federal government was called upon to 
assume a role which was a departure from the general 
duties of conquering powers, and for which it was per- 
haps in large measure unprepared. Indeed, when, early in 
the conflict, a small portion of South Carolina came under 
its control, the government of the United States was placed 
in the somewhat anomalous position of quasi-master. That 
is to say, along with the acquisition of the hostile territory 
it had acquired the burden of subsisting and directing the 
labors of the large numbers of slaves, and these were, in 
part, the duties of a master. The white people had with- 
drawn upon the approach of the Federals. 



io8 Early Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [ io8 

It will be remembered that by an expedition under Com- 
modore Dupont in December, 1861, certain of the sea islands 
off the southern coast of South Carolina and the district 
of Beaufort fell into the hands of the Union forces/ In this 
scope of country the negroes largely predominated and their 
condition, bereft as they were of those accustomed to pro- 
vide for them, was that of absolute helplessness. The mili- 
tary authorities being thus called upon to bear an unlooked- 
for burden. General T, W. Sherman, in February, 1862, 
issued an order urging the benevolent and philanthropic 
people of the North to come to the help of the blacks within 
the limits of the command. A deep interest was aroused in 
the Northern States and very soon relief associations were 
organized for the purpose of collecting and forwarding sup- 
plies, and for supporting teachers, preachers, and superin- 
tendents of labor. In the following month, a band of about 
sixty volunteer laborers, among whom were the wife of Sena- 
tor Harlan and fifteen other ladies, arrived at Port Royal, 
South Carolina, on board an army transport vessel. This com- 
pany of teachers and superintendents of labor was in charge 
of E. L. Pierce, of Boston, and Rev. Mansfield French, and 
their operations were chiefly confined to the islands around 
Port Royal Sound. They distributed, in considerable 
amounts, clothing, books, pamphlets, farming implements 
and seeds ; and during the year they conducted schools in 
which about 3000 negro children received instruction.* But 
it soon became necessary to supersede the various benevolent 
organizations in the work of administering relief, and the 
treasury department was put in charge of the plantations. 
E. L. Pierce was made agent for South Carolina and in- 
structed to " prevent the deterioration of the estates, secure 
their best possible cultivation under the circumstances," and 
promote the welfare of the blacks.' 

On April 29, 1862, Secretary of War Stanton assigned 

^ Supra, p. II. 

° Official Records, Ser. Ill, Ser. No. 123, p. 55. 

° Report of the Secretary of War, 1869-70, I, 498. 



109] ^/'^ Frcedmen's Bureau. 109 

Brigadier-General Rufus Saxton to duty in the Department 
of the South, directing him to take possession of all planta- 
tions formerly occupied by " rebels," which the fortunes of 
war had already or might afterwards bring into the depart- 
ment. He was at the same time to have control of the 
negroes remaining on the plantations, with authority to make 
such regulations for the cultivation of the land and the 
employment of the blacks as circumstances required. In 
cases of actual destitution among the negroes, Saxton was 
directed to issue rations and articles of clothing, to be fur- 
nished by the quartermaster and commissary of the depart- 
ment of the South. Industry, skill in agriculture, and self- 
improvement were to be promoted as far as possible.* But 
Saxton, for some time after his appointment, had to concen- 
trate his attention more especially upon holding the islands 
against the Confederates, and the pursuits of peace con- 
tinued for a while longer in the control of the agents of the 
treasury. But, for one reason or another, there seems to 
have been considerable difficulty and much hindrance in the 
farming operations.' E. L. Pierce, the special treasury agent 
on the islands of South Carolina and " general superintend- 
ent and director of the negroes," complained feelingly be- 
cause General Hunter, temporarily commanding the depart- 
ment of the South, ordered the overseers of plantations of 
Ladies, St. Helena, and Coosaw Islands, to send all able- 
bodied negroes to Beaufort to be enrolled as soldiers. He 
explained that the treasury department had already expended 
large amounts, viz., implements and seeds, $5,000; mules 
and horses, $15,000; labor, $10,000; and clothing supplied by 
voluntary associations, $10,000. This order coming in May, 
after the planting of the crops had substantially closed, 
would entail the loss of practically all that had been done.' 
The negroes showed themselves very averse to bearing 
arms in the common defense, and reports were numerous 
that upon suspicions of a draft, many of them made shift 

* Official Records, Ser. Ill, Ser. No. 123, p. 27. 

*Ibid. " Ibid., p. 55. 



I lo Early Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [ i lo 

to escape to the woods.' The islands cultivated by the blacks 
had to be abandoned from time to time in proportion as the 
Federal regiments protecting the laborers were withdrawn 
during the year. In view of the withdrawal of the last regi- 
ment to Fort Monroe, General Hunter reported that St. 
Helena, Ladies, Port Royal, Paris, and Spring Islands, all 
under a fine state of cultivation, would have to be aban- 
doned.* 

So necessary was it thought to have a military force at 
hand to protect the negroes in their agricultural operations, 
that Saxton, in August, asked authority of the secretary of 
war to enroll a force not exceeding 5000 able-bodied men 
from among the contrabands, as a means of protection. He 
pointed out that along the entire coast occupied by the Fed- 
erals, the colored people suffered greatly from fear of attack 
by their Confederate masters. Their labors were thereby 
more or less contracted and their efforts for social and moral 
improvement paralyzed. It was maintained that with an 
adequate military force to guarantee against recapture, an 
immense number of the negroes " could be withdrawn from 
the enemy and thereby very materially increase our power 
over these traitors to our country." ' 

Stanton complied with Saxton's request, granting him 
permission to " organize and receive into the service of the 
United States as soldiers ' volunteers of African descent ' 
not exceeding 5000." Besides guarding the plantations and 
reoccupying the islands, this force was to make incursions 
into the " rebel " territory for the purpose of bringing away 
the negroes, and thus reducing the resources of the Con- 
federates.^" But this second effort to recruit colored troops 
was, like the first, not attended with very marked success. 
The number recruited fell far short of the contemplated 
5000, and Saxton reported that comparatively few of the 
negroes were physically fit for soldiers. But it is worthy 

' Ibid. » Ibid., Series I, Vol. XIV, p. 374- 

'Ibid., Ser. I, Vol. Ill, p. 375. 

"Ibid., p. zyj; Ibid., Ser. Ill, Ser. No. 125, p. 1027. 



Ill] The Freedmens Bureau. iii 

of note that it was under these recruiting instructions that 
the first negro regiment was mustered into the Federal army. 
It was known as the First Regiment, South Carolina Volun- 
teers, and was commanded by Colonel T, W. Higginson, of 
Massachusetts. This pioneer regiment came into some 
notice later in connection with the military operations at 
Fort Wagner and Port Hudson." As to results in farming 
operations for the year 1862, Saxton reported that the har- 
vest did not " answer the promise of the early season." 
This was, he said, on account of late planting, the ravages 
of the army worm and the abandonment of a large acreage 
of cotton and corn after the withdrawal of the army and 
the freedmen. The yield of cotton had amounted to only 
about 50,000 pounds of ginned product (100 bales). But 
the report of the next year was an improvement on that of 
1862." The cotton crop for 1863 amounted to 110,000 
pounds of ginned cotton, and sufficient food products had 
been raised to subsist the blacks in the cotton cultivation. 
The cotton, it was claimed, would more than meet all the 
contingent care and direction of 15,000 freedmen, a majority 
of whom, as stated, had proved self-supporting under the 
system ; to such as required the support of the government, 
viz., aged or infirm persons and destitute refugees, he had 
issued rations." 

It was in the latter part of the year 1863 that the Federal 
government added a new feature to its policy of dealing 
with the blacks which, for a long time afterwards, was fruit- 
ful of much confusion and disappointment to the negroes 
and of real harm to both races. It will be remembered that 
an act for the collection of direct taxes in insurrectionary 
districts was passed by Congress on June 7, 1862." This 
act was followed later by two others which were somewhat 
similar to the first in their purport. One of these latter was 
approved July 17, 1862, and provided for the punishment of 

" Ibid., p. 1027. '" Ibid., p. 1024. 

"Official Records, Series III, Sen No. 125, p. 119. 

'' Report on the Finances, 2nd sess. 38th Cong., 1864-65, p. 330. 



112 Early Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [112 

treason and the seizure and confiscation of " rebel " prop- 
erty. The other act, of March 12, 1863, provided for the 
appropriation of abandoned property/^ Through the en- 
forcement of the acts, notably the direct tax act, the Federal 
government came into possession of practically all the landed 
property in South Carolina then under its sway.'" In the 
furtherance of the amelioration of the condition of the 
blacks, it was decided to put the negroes in possession of a 
suitable portion of the confiscated lands." 

With this purpose in mind. President Lincoln, in Septem- 
ber, 1863, issued instructions to the tax commissioners to 
sell all the unreserved government lands. Parts of these 
were to be sold at auction in lots not exceeding 320 acres ; 
the rest at private sale for $1.25 per acre to negro families, 
no family to have more than twenty acres.^' It soon was 
evident that the plan to enable negroes to become land- 
holders would be defeated if these instructions were carried 
out. The purchase of lands in such large tracts being be- 
yond the reach of the blacks, the great bulk of the lands, it 
was seen, would pass into the hands of speculators. Accord- 
ingly, on December 30, 1863, new instructions were issued 
to the tax commissioners, giving limited pre-emption rights, 
at the rate of $1.25 per acre, to all loyal persons of twenty- 
one years of age then residing upon, or who at any time since 
the occupation by the United States forces had for six 
months resided upon, any lands in the district. Preference 
was to be given to heads of families and to married women 
whose husbands were engaged in the service of the United 
States. Soldiers, sailors and marines were to be permitted 
to pre-empt and purchase land on the same terms." But 



" Ibid., p. 338. 

" The manner of collecting the direct tax in South Carohna was 
looked upon by the white people as a great hardship. In conse- 
quence of the State's non-payment of the tax the lands in possession 
of the Federals were seized to pay the tax for the whole State. 
Plantations were put up for taxes and the authorities did not 
return any surplus to the owners. 

" Official Records, Ser. Ill, Ser. No. 125, p. 1025. 

" Ibid. " Ibid., p. 120. 



113] The Freedmen's Bureau. 113 

this scheme of the President's, which promised to open the 
way for the negro to become what he most desired to be, a 
land owner, did not meet expectations. The tax commis- 
sioners refused to recognize the new instructions, on the 
ground of their illegaHty, and they were suspended by the 
secretary of the treasury.^ But, previous to this suspension, 
many of the freedmen had proceeded to stake their claims 
and otherwise to deport themselves as independent proprie- 
tors of the soil. Hence the confusion and disappointment 
resulting from the suspension of the instructions was very 
great. The negroes, highly emotional in their natures, were 
all exultation at first and afterwards despondent." But the 
idea that they were to become, at the hands of the Federal 
government, permanent landlords, took possession of them, 
and was, as will be shown, a source of continual annoyance 
during the reconstruction era. 

The captured lands in South Carolina having been thus 
disposed of to speculators and other smaller purchasers, 
there were no agricultural operations carried on by the 
government in South Carolina in 1864. The duties of Gen- 
eral Saxton for the year were limited to the enforcement of 
regulations for the sanitary condition and policing of the 
department, and to the protection of the freedmen."'' 

Saxton admits in his report that in fulfilling his mission 
of " atonement for the wrongs and oppression " of the 
negroes, he was confronted with a difficult task and was not 
always successful. He found that the general feeling of the 
army of occupation was unfriendly to the blacks. There 
was a disposition, he said, among the soldiers and civilian 
speculators " to defraud the negroes in their private traffic, 
to take the commodities which they offered for sale by force, 
or to pay for them in worthless money." Other charges 
made against the Federal soldiery by General Saxton were 
that depredations were committed by them on the plantations 
of negroes, and their crops and domestic animals taken and 

'" Ibid, p. 1026. "^ Ibid. ~ Ibid., p. 1022. 



1 14 Early Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [ 1 14 

destroyed ; that the colored women were held as the legiti- 
mate prey of lust ; that licentiousness was widespread ; and 
that the morals of the old plantation life seemed revived in 
the army of occupation. On account of these things, the 
joy of the negroes at the coming of the " Yankees " had 
tended to cool down."^ 

Thus did matters stand until General W. T. Sherman 
issued his special Field Orders, No. 15, on January 16, 
1865.'' As touching South Carolina the orders provided 
that the islands along the coast from Charleston, south, and 
the abandoned lands for thirty miles back from the sea, 
should be " reserved and set apart for the settlement of 
negroes." Within this reservation no white person, except 
military officers and soldiers detailed for duty, was to be 
permitted to reside. The orders further stipulated, that 
wherever three respectable negroes, heads of families, de- 
sired to settle on land and had selected for that purpose an 
island or other locality, the inspector of settlements and 
plantations was to give them a license and afford them 
assistance in establishing a peaceable agricultural settlement. 
To each family was to be apportioned a plot of not more 
than forty acres of tillable ground." The negroes were to 
be afforded protection in the possession of their lands until 
Congress should regulate their titles. General Saxton was 
appointed inspector of settlements and plantations. It was 
announced in the orders that no changes would be made in 
the settlements on Beaufort and Hilton Head Islands, and 
no rights to property previously acquired, affected. 

General Sherman's plan hardly had time to be put into 
operation before an act of Congress, entitled " an act to 
establish a bureau of freedmen, refugees and abandoned 

*Ibid., p. 1029. 

'"It will be remembered that Gen. Sherman entered on the 
campaign of the Carolinas early in January, 1865. His army in- 
vaded South Carolina from Savannah, and consequently overran that 
part of the State first which is comprehended in the southern angle. 
Page 21, above. 

" This is probably the origin of the " forty acres and a mule " 
will-o'-the-wisp that will be so often heard of later. 



115] The Freedmen's Bureau. 115 

lands," was passed/" This act did not, however, result in 
an overthrow of Sherman's plan, but rather aided in its 
fulfillment. Under it a commissioner was to be appointed as 
the chief officer of the Bureau and he in turn to appoint 
assistant commissioners for the several insurrectionary 
States. General O. O. Howard received the appointment as 
commissioner, and named General Saxton as the assistant 
commissioner for South Carolina and Georgia, his duties 
being afterwards diminished by an officer being sent to take 
charge of Georgia.*^ 

On May 30, Howard issued a circular letter prescribing 
the rules and regulations for assistant commissioners. Re- 
lief establishments were to be discontinued as speedily as 
possible, and every effort made to render the people self- 
supporting. Where government supplies were advanced to 
destitutes, exact accounts were to be kept and held as a lien 
upon their crops. In all cases where the local courts re- 
fused to allow negroes to testify, or otherwise disregarded 
their rights, the assistant commissioners were to adjudicate 
the difficulties. It should be seen to that negroes were free 
to choose their own employers, and paid for their labor. 
Contracts should be entered into freely, approved by proper 
officers, and inviolably enforced on both parties.^ 

Immediately following this general order — June 10 — Sax- 
ton issued a circular assuming control of the Bureau, with 
headquarters at Beaufort, South Carolina. He announced 
that the bureau was entrusted with the management of all 
abandoned lands, with the educational, industrial, and other 
interests of the freedmen, and, in pursuance of Sherman's 
policy, with " the location of such as may desire it on homes 
of forty acres." The policy which had been pursued on the 
sea islands of South Carolina and Georgia would be con- 
tinued. The negroes were exhorted to be thankful for the 
great boon of liberty which had been vouchsafed to them, 

" United States Statutes at Large, Vol. XIII, p. 507. 
"Ex. Doc, 1st sess. 39th Cong., No. 11, p. 3. 
* Ibid., No. 70, p. 102. 



1 16 Early Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [ 1 16 

while the late masters were advised to heed the teachings of 
the great struggle through which the country had passed." 

Further to instruct the freedmen as to their new relations 
in life, Saxton, on August i6, issued a circular exclusively 
to the freedmen, extending them words of counsel. They 
were given to understand that by the emancipation procla- 
mation, the laws of Congress, and the will of God, they 
were " forever free." But freedom carried with it the 
responsibilities of freemen. " Your first duty is to go to 
work at whatever honest labor your hands can find to do, 
and provide food, clothing and shelter for your families. 
Bear in mind that a man who will not work should not be 
allowed to eat." Their former masters contended that in 
freedom they would not work, that the lash was necessary 
to drive them to the cotton and rice fields ; but forty thou- 
sand of their race on the sea islands were proving the fal- 
sity of this charge and setting an example which all the 
blacks would do well to follow. 

Falsehood and theft, the vices of slavery, should not be 
found in freedom. Contracts and agreements they should 
keep in good faith, it being constantly remembered that they 
were slaves no longer. They should not attempt to redress 
their own wrongs, if such should be suffered at the hands of 
the whites, but leave matters to be settled by an arbitration 
committee. The domestic relations in slavery did not re- 
quire purity and honor among the blacks, but all this must 
change. The rules of the marriage relation, issued from 
bureau headquarters, should be carefully studied and put 
into practice. " Colored men and women, prove by your 
future lives that you can be virtuous and pure." No people 
could be truly great or free without education, hence freed- 
men shovild deny themselves even the necessaries of life to 
keep their children in school. They should strive to live 
down by good conduct the wicked lies of their enemies, who 

*Ibid., p. 91. 



117] The Freedmens Bureau. 117 

would make it appear that they were not worthy of the full 
rights of freemen.'" 

Pains were taken that this excellent advice should be 
given wide publicity. Agents of the bureau were directed 
to publish the circular to the freedmen, and ministers of the 
Gospel requested to have it read in all the churches where 
freedmen assembled. It is not definitely known how favor- 
ably this circular was received and what influence it exerted 
for good ; but evidently counsel of this nature, persistently 
given by the head of the bureau, could not fail to have a 
desirable effect. And it may be surprising that the bureau, 
begun thus auspiciously, did not accomplish better results." 
The difificulty must have been that the bureau, under the 
disorganized conditions, and administered in its numerous 
branches by a great variety of officers, some most unscrupu- 
lous," adhered to no well-defined policy. 

The assistant commissioner was not long in letting the 
whites understand that he meant to uphold the rights and 
privileges of the blacks. His first general order, issued on 
June 20, 1865, set forth that complaint had been made that 
former owners of plantations, permitted to remain on their 
lands on condition that they apprise the blacks of their free- 
dom, continued to hold them in slavery and even shot them 
down if they dared to assert their liberty. He therefore 
announced that all persons employing freedmen and who 
failed to announce to their employes that they were free, 
would be held as disloyal to the United States government 
and their property subject to seizure and division among the 
freedmen. It was urged upon the commissioners and agents 
of the bureau to give wide circulation to this order, and to 
send to headquarters the name of every person guilty of its 
infringement."' 

The number of acres of abandoned and confiscated land 
held by the bureau in South Carolina was 435,000, consid- 

^°Ex. Doc, 1st sess. 39th Cong., No. 70, pp. 92, 93. 

" Carl Schurz, Article in McClure's Magazine for Jan., 1904. 

"Ex. Doc, ist sess. 39th Cong., No. 70, p. 99. "Ibid. 



1 18 Early Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [ 1 18 

erably more than four times as much as was held in any- 
other two States, grouped as the States were at that time." 
As by the estabHshment of the bureau it was not intended 
to supersede or destroy the work of settlement already done 
in behalf of the freedmen, the same general policy with re- 
gard to them was adhered to. Leases already made by the 
treasury agents were allowed to continue in force, and others 
in addition were made by the bureau.^' 

The wholesale confiscation of property along the coast 
and the general devastation of the war left the whites about 
as destitute as the blacks. Hence it was not long after the 
organization of the bureau, in view of President Johnson's 
policy of leniency, until the whites began to plead for a 
restoration of their property. The course which the bureau 
first adopted was to restore property to none except those 
who could give proof of undoubted loyalty to the Union. 
And the production of a pardon granted under the Presi- 
dent's amnesty proclamation was not accepted as sufficient 
proof. But Johnson overruled this method of settling prop- 
erty rights and gave orders that his pardon entitled the 
holder to demand and receive immediate restoration of his 
property, except such as had been sold under a decree of 
confiscation.'" This order of the President's called forth 
Circular No. 15 from General Howard, which directed as- 
sistant commissioners to turn over at once all property held 
as abandoned, when they were convinced that it did not 
fall within the province of the confiscation act of July 2, 
1864." They were also directed to restore property when 
application was made for it accompanied by proof of the 
claimant's title, and of his pardon. But land cultivated by 
refugees or freedmen should be retained until the growing 
crops were gathered, unless the owner made full compen- 
sation for the labor expended on it and for its products.^* 

^*Ex. Doc, 1st sess. 39th Cong., No. 70, p. 93. 

''Ibid., No. II, p. 4. '"Ibid. 

" United States Statutes at Large, Vol. XIII, p. 375. 

°* Ex. Doc, 1st sess. 39th Cong., No. 70, p. 193. 



119] The Freedmen's Bureau. 119 

Under the provisions of this circular the work of restora- 
tion progressed steadily. In his report for 1867, General 
Howard stated that 13,351 acres had been restored during 
the year, leaving 85,694 acres still in possession of the bu- 
reau/" In returning the lands to their rightful owners, the 
greatest difficulty arose over the disappointment of the 
freedmen in the well-founded expectations built up by Sher- 
man's Special Field Orders, No. 15. Under direction from 
the war department, General Howard came to Charleston 
with the purpose of effecting an arrangement materially 
satisfactory to the land-owners and those freedmen who had 
" squatted " on the property of the former and refused to 
move. Howard then proceeded to Edisto Island, the locality 
in South Carolina where this question of restoration was 
pressing hardest for a solution. Arrived at the island, he 
met with and explained to the colored people the status of 
affairs, and asked their desires. They expressed a wish to 
be relieved from working under overseers, a majority of 
them indicating a desire to rent land, some a willingness to 
work for wages. Finally, it was agreed to leave the decision 
to Howard, who determined upon the following plan: 

A board of supervisors, consisting of a representative of 
the government, of the planter, and of the freedmen, was 
to be constituted, to adjust contracts and cases of difficulty. 
These boards came to have authority to pass upon all of- 
fenses of which the penalty did not exceed imprisonment 
for one month, or a fine of one hundred dollars."* 

Before the order of restoration could be issued, each land- 
owner was required to sign an obligation to secure to the 
freedmen resident on his estate the crop of the present 
season, harvested or unharvested ; to allow freedmen to re- 
main at their homes so long as they entered into contracts 
on terms satisfactory to the supervising board ; to contract 
with responsible negroes, a refusal to do so on the part of 
the latter being accompanied by a requirement to leave the 

'" Report of the Secretary of War, 1867-68, p. 622. 
^"Ex. Doc, 1st sess. 39th Cong., No. 11, p. 7. 



1 20 Early Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [ 1 20 

estate ; to interfere in no way with schools sanctioned by 
the board. This obligation was not to be binding beyond 
one year from its date of issue. If it should be faithfully 
complied with, land-owners deprived of their property by 
General Sherman's order were to have their estates restored 
to their possession." 

But the blacks appeared not to regard seriously the regu- 
lations laid down relative to entering into contracts and the 
adoption of more stringent measures was discussed by the 
whites. Said the Columbia Phoenix : " The laborers are 
here sufficient in numbers and effective in results in the 
past, but no man of ordinary observation or common sense 
can deny that, in their present state of transition and disor- 
ganization, some code of labor — some system of contracts 
between proprietors and workers binding on both parties — • 
is absolutely necessary. The government, through the estab- 
lishment of the Freedmen's Bureau, has tried to effect this 
object, but there are so many difficulties and embarrassments 
to encounter that the great end sought has not been accom- 
plished." '" The situation was such that Saxton felt called 
on to issue a circular on October 19. The impression largely 
prevailed among the freedmen, he said, that on January i, 
1866, the Federal government was to give them homesteads 
of forty acres, and that for the coming year it was not 
necessary to enter into contracts with their former masters 
or other employers. This was an erroneous impression and 
Bureau agents should inform the freedmen that the govern- 
ment had no lands to divide among them. To provide 
against suffering and starvation the freedmen were urged 
to sign agreements at once for the coming year, and the 
supervising boards provided for by General Howard's order 
were directed to arrange equitable contracts between em- 
ployers and employes.^^ Complaints of the idleness of the 
blacks, and of their unwillingness to make contracts became 

"Ex. Doc, 1st sess. 39th Cong., No. 11, p. 7. 

"The Columbia Phoenix, Oct. 18, 1865. 

*' Ex. Doc, 1st sess. 39th Cong., No. 70, p. 95. 



121 ] The Freedmen's Bureau. 121 

so pronounced that Howard directed that the full force of the 
vagrancy laws of the various Southern States should descend 
upon the freedmen. He gave it as his opinion that the prev- 
alence of the idea that the estates of disloyal owners would 
be divided among the freedmen was due to stories circulated 
by speculators desirous of cheapening the lands/* But 
some of the native whites were of a different opinion as to 
who was responsible for spreading the notion among the 
negroes that each was to receive a tract of land of forty 
acres. The blame was placed upon the unscrupulous bureau 
agents: "They (the freedmen) have been taught to be- 
lieve, by the Freedmen's Bureau, that the whole of Beaufort 
is abandoned and dedicated to their use — that they are to be 
colonized there. They therefore look upon the owners of 
the lands as intruders and enemies." " 

During the year 1865, if full credit is to be given to briefs 
of reports sent in by the sub-assistant commissioners, the 
condition of the negroes was by no means favorable. Ac- 
counts from the interior were replete with instances of mur- 
ders, whipping, tying up by the thumbs, defrauding of 
wages, combining for purposes of extortion, and other cruel- 
ties toward the negroes by the whites."* But it would seem 
from an examination of the briefs that much of this alleged 
cruelty was mere rumor and that the accounts were over- 
drawn. General Howard said that from observation the 
briefs did not give a true picture of the state of society in 
South Carolina. Owing to the sickness of General Saxton, 
the organization of the bureau throughout the State was 
delayed till near the close of the year, which might account 

** Ibid., No. II, p. 12. I have been reliably informed that spec- 
ulators drove a thriving business in selling red sticks to the negroes, 
who were told that these were necessary in order to stake off a 
forty-acre claim. Notes of a conversation with the late Prof. R. M. 
Davis. 

" Letter to Gov. Perry from citizens of Beaufort District. Phoenix, 
Sept. 29, 1865. 

** These briefs of reports of sub-assistant commissioners are 
printed in the Report of the Joint Committee on Reconstruction, 
1866, p. 222, et seq. 



1 22 Early Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [ 122 

in part for such an unfavorable report. Still the antagonism 
between the whites and blacks was marked, and the " crim- 
inal list altogether too great to pass unnoticed." " 

A not unimportant feature of the bureau was its medical 
department. This department was found necessary in order 
to regulate hospitals and asylums already in existence and 
to extend medical aid to freedmen who on becoming sick 
were totally unprovided for."* Surgeon N. R. De Wett, Jr., 
United States Volunteers, was appointed surgeon-in-chief 
for South Carolina and Georgia." The duties of a surgeon- 
in-chief, as set forth in Howard's instructions to medical 
officers, were to ascertain the number of persons in his dis- 
trict needing medical attendance, to direct subordinate med- 
ical officers, and to have general supervision of the medical 
department. He was also to make a report to the surgeon- 
general of the United States army.°° For 1865, the report 
showed that there were in the State one commissioned medi- 
cal officer, fifteen private physicians employed under contract, 
twenty-nine attendants, three hospitals and six camps and 
colonies." In addition to these efforts at sick relief, the 
government also undertook, on rather a large scale, to re- 
lieve the destitute. The number of dependents drawing ra- 
tions in South Carolina and Georgia on September i, 1865, 
was 10,664." In South Carolina alone, in 1866, 1,111,847 
rations were issued,"^ and in 1867, 1,052,952. 

Another matter about which the assistant commissioner 
deemed it advisable to make regulations was the marriage 
of the negroes. By these regulations he said it was hoped 
something might be done to " correct a monster evil which 
meets us at the very threshold of our work." " Some of the 
more important features of the regulations were that mar- 

"Ex. Doc, 1st sess. 39th Cong., No. 11, p. 26. 
"Ibid., No. 70, p. 18. "Ibid., p. 114. 

'"Ibid., p. 187. "Ibid., No. 11, p. 26. 

"^ Ibid. The reports of the two States for this year are not given 
separately. 

" Report of the Secretary of War, 1866-67, P- 7'^:^- 
"Ibid., 1867-68, p. 640. 



123] The Freed men's Bureau. 123 

ried persons of color producing satisfactory evidence of sep- 
aration by slavery, and who had, in prospect of permanent 
disunion, been married a second time, might be allowed to 
assume their former relations of man and wife. Marriages 
of freedmen might be dissolved on account of adultery, 
fornication, or other prudential reason. Every freedman 
having only one name was required to assume a " title," 
and keep it. All negroes, whose marriage was only a mutual 
agreement between themselves without public ceremony, 
were required to have their marriage confirmed by a min- 
ister. A man living without a wife and finding two wives 
restored to him — the one having children by him, the other 
not — was to take the mother of his children as his lawful 
wife. A husband living with a wife, but having no children 
by her, might be permitted to take a previous wife, provided 
he had minor children by such wife, and provided other 
husbands and wives, should there be any, assented to the 
change. The same regulations were to apply to married 
women similarly situated." 

As already indicated, there was a pronounced effort made 
from the first establishment of the bureau to begin and pro- 
mote the education of the negroes. One of the chief officers 
in each State was the superintendent of education. The 
■superintendent appointed for South Carolina was Reuben 
Tomlinson.'" The freedmen displayed great eagerness in 
their struggle to be, and to have their children, educated, 
and the pupils crowded into the schools. These were sup- 
ported, some by the bureau, some by Northern benevolent 
associations, and some by the freedmen themselves. As to 
the attitude of the whites toward negro schools, Howard 
reported in 1866 that the better classes of the whites were 
coming very generally to favor the education of the freed- 
men. But they usually favored it with the proviso that 
Northern whites be not longer employed as teachers. There 



"Ex. Doc, ist sess. 39th Cong., p. 108, et seq. 
°*Ibid., No. 70, p. 116. 



124 Early Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [124 

were those, he said, of the lower and baser classes, who still 
bitterly opposed negro education ; but altogether there was 
cause for congratulation in view of the immense results 
obtained. The report for the year shows that in September, 
1865, there were in South Carolina and Georgia 114 schools, 
174 teachers, and 9,500 scholars." For South Carolina alone, 
in June, 1866, there were 75 schools, 148 teachers, and 9,017 
pupils. $72,000 had been expended in support of these 75 
schools, contributed mainly by Northern benevolent asso- 
ciations. The freedmen had erected five school houses and 
were in process of erecting others."' Encouraging accounts 
continued to come in during the year 1867. Twenty-three 
school houses had been erected in the different districts, and 
$12,200 contributed by the colored people for the support 
of teachers. And there was a growing conviction among 
the whites that to educate the blacks was the wise course to 
tLke." But a later report would indicate that the efforts of 
the negroes in behalf of education were somewhat spas- 
modic. Superintendent Tomlinson announced in June, 1868, 
that the number of schools had decreased to 49, the number 
of teachers to 123, and the pupils to 6,698. These schools 
were taught largely by white teachers imported from the 
North." 

A very considerable amount of attention was bestowed by 
the bureau on the administration of justice in behalf of the 
freedmen. The assistant commissioners were instructed at 
the outset to protect the freedmen and promote the general 
welfare of the negroes. With this end in view, freedmen's 
courts, constituted of officers of the bureau, or of civilians 
where officers were scarce, had been early established. These 
courts were usually restricted to the settlement of minor 
cases where punishment did not exceed one hundred dollars 
or thirty days' imprisonment. Where the negro's rights 

"Ex. Doc, ist sess. 39th Cong., No. 11, p. 26. 
°* Report of the Secretary of War, 1866-67, p. 716. 
" Ibid., 1867-68, p. 673. 
'"Report of the Secretary of War, 1868-9, P- 1041. 



125] ^^'^ Frcedmens Bureau. 125 

were disregarded, on account of any interruption in the civil 
law by reason of old slave codes, the bureau courts were to 
adjudicate all difficulties." 

There was some complexity and confusion attendant upon 
the administration of justice. Conflicts and many misun- 
derstandings grew out of the activity of the provost courts 
as distinct from the bureau courts. This was due in a 
measure to the fact that the department military comman- 
ders and the assistant commissioner had their headquarters 
at different places, and there was no co-operation. But the 
situation was rendered more complex at this time by reason 
of the fact that the civil courts claimed unquestioned juris- 
diction throughout the entire State. This condition of af- 
fairs continued until late in the year 1865, when it was 
remedied by an agreement between Provisional Governor 
Perry and the military division commander that freedmen's 
cases should be brought before provost courts.'^ 

There were complaints and counter complaints during 
this period. The whites entered a general protest against 
the presence of colored troops, on account of whom there 
was a feeling of great insecurity."' It was alleged that labor 
was disturbed throughout a large district of the vicinity of 
a negro garrison, and that there was danger of the colored 
troops joining the blacks "in case of insurrection."" On 
the other hand, the bureau authorities reminded the whites 
that by the laws of the several Southern States the negro 
was regarded as an alien, that he was visited with numerous 
oppressions, prohibited from bearing arms in his own de- 
fense, and denied the right to serve as a juror.'" It appears 
that for a year or more this crimination and recrimination 
relative to the status of the blacks in the courts was kept 
up. Finally, however, some order was restored by the dis- 
continuance of the provost courts, which action was taken 



"Ex. Doc, I St sess. 39th Cong., No. 11, pp. 22, 23. 

"Page 45, above; Ex. Doc, ist sess. 39th Cong., No. 11, p. 

" Phoenix, Sept. 29, 1865. 

"Ex. Doc, ist sess. 39th Cong., No. 11, p. 26. 

"Report of the Secretary of War, 1866-67, P- 7i8- 



126 Early Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [ 126 

after the legislature had annulled the most objectionable 
features of the law discriminating against persons of color. 
The bureau courts were also discontinued about the same 
time and the blacks, with the right to testify and serve as 
jurors, were tried in the civil district courts.'^ 

But the report for the year 1867 recommended that the 
bureau courts be re-established. These were needed, it was 
said, in order to protect the blacks and adjudicate disputes 
which arose in the division of the crops. In Edgefield Dis- 
trict the white planters were alleged to have retained the 
entire proceeds of the crops, not allowing the negroes for 
their year's work any compensation whatever. Such cases 
did not come within the jurisdiction of magistrates, who 
could only sit on suits involving an inconsiderable sum. 
Moreover, magistrates would not bind over a white man for 
trial unless the complaining freedman would give security 
to the amount of $200 or $300, and this was generally im- 
possible. The very poor yields of the cotton crops of 1867 
and 1868 caused the planters to resort to the practice of 
making up their losses by unfair divisions with the black 
tenants, and by imposing fines for absence and sickness.*" 

Again, it was asserted that the freedmen could get no pro- 
tection from the civil courts against criminals and other out- 
laws. One officer reported that the civil law was a source of 
power and oppression in the hands of a few, it being an 
expensive luxury. Outrages and cases of lawless violence, 
perpetrated upon the persons and property of the freedmen, 
were of unusual frequency and until the " slow but certain 
influence of civilization reaches this State and produces a 
change in the unjust and tyrannical laws by which it is 
governed," the bureau tribunals should be maintained.^ 

The obligation which the bureau assumed to supervise 
labor contracts between the whites and the blacks appears 
in some places to have served a very good purpose. Of 

^ Report of the Secretary of War, 1866-67, P- 738. 
" Ibid., 1867-68, p. 669, et seq. 
'' Ibid., p. 670. 



127] The Freedmen's Bureau. 127 

course this depended largely upon the personality of the 
sub-assistant commissioner in charge of the local bureau. 
Major Delaney, the colored assistant at Beaufort, said that 
" the planters at first disliked the presence of the bureau in 
their midst ; but powerless to retard its operations and wit- 
nessing its impartial administration and the growing pros- 
perity of their district as a result, have reconciled themselves 
and some have even acknowledged it as a success." "' But, 
on the other hand, numerous instances of friction were not 
lacking. The whites were very much annoyed by the at- 
tempts of the bureau agents to regulate the number of holi- 
days for the blacks, by the conferring upon them of special 
privileges relative to bearing arms, and by not allowing the 
whites to eject colored tenants from their plantations except 
by the approval of the bureau.™ 

Again, the blacks showed a willingness, in some years, to 
enter into contracts ; in others, they did not. It will be re- 
membered that rather strong persuasion was necessary to 
get the freedmen to enter into any agreements for 1866." 
General Saxton outlined a form of contract wherein em- 
ployers were to furnish freedmen with quarters, fuel, sub- 
stantial rations, medical attendance, and a given amount of 
money to be paid in full before the final disposal of the crop.'" 
Upon these terms, Saxton's admonitions appear to have been 
well received ; for he reported in May that the blacks had 
entered into contracts with a willingness and unanimity be- 
yond the expectation of the most sanguine. Planters as- 
serted that in most cases they were " doing more work than 
was ever done under the old system of forced labor." " 

But this condition of aflfairs was not destined to be of 
long duration. The very next year it was found necessary 
to again issue a circular calling attention to the importance 

" Frank A. Rollin, Life of Major M. R. Delaney, p. 270. 

'" Report of Joint Committee on Reconstruction, p. 229. 

"' Page 120, above. 

"Ex. Doc, ist sess. 39th Cong., No. 70, p. 96. 

" Report of the Secretary of War, 1866-67, p. 737. 



1 28 Early Period of Reconstruction in South Carolina. [ 1 28 

of making contracts. All this time many things were trans- 
piring to produce greater estrangement and ill-feeling be- 
tween the races. Idleness and theft were constantly charged 
against the blacks, who would consume their wages in ad- 
vance and then stop work. On the other hand, the blacks 
accused the whites of fraud in the settlement of contracts, 
and of dismissal from service for voting contrary to their 
wishes. These things and the political differences of the 
time caused the labor agreements for the year to be much 
delayed and very unsatisfactory.^* 

After the State had come into the control of the new 
political power, in 1868, the troubles arising out of contracts 
appear to have subsided. The commissioner reported in the 
fall of 1869 that the " contract system works favorably. 
But few complaints are made against freedmen for refusing 
to work. The approval of contracts by agents of the Bureau 
has had an excellent effect in securing a compliance with 
their provisions." ^° 

The operations of the Bureau were practically closed in 
South Carolina in July, 1868. At that time it will be remem- 
bered that the State, completely dominated by the negroes 
and " carpet-baggers," had been restored to the Union. 
There was, therefore, no reason for continuing an institution 
for the protection of a people who exercised entire political 
control in the State. General R. K. Scott, the successor, in 
1866, of Saxton as assistant commissioner, was now gover- 
nor, he with many of his associates having become officers 
of the State instead of officers of the Bureau. An act of 
Congress of July 25, 1868, required the commissioner to 
cause the withdrawal of the Bureau from the States, except 
that its educational and bounty features were to remain. 
Notice was accordingly given to the officers and agents to 
discontinue operations after January i, 1869." 

By way of comment, it may be said that what made the 

'* Report of the Secretary of War, 1868-69, P- I040- 
" Ibid., 1869-70, p. 503. 
"Ibid., p. 497. 



129] TJie Freednien's Bureau. 129 

Bureau objectionable and at times intolerable to the whites 
was the fact that it undertook to regulate, in the minutest 
detail, the intercourse between the races ; and apparently 
even to say in what esteem the blacks should be held by the 
whites. Instead of serving as a harmonizing agency, the 
then all-important matter, it was instrumental in many cases 
in sowing seeds of discontent and in otherwise destroying 
friendly relations between ex-master and former slave. This 
charge cannot be made against the bureau as a whole in 
South Carolina, but certainly one gathers the general im- 
pression that its operations were by no means attended by 
entirely beneficial results. It may not be going too far to 
say that numbers of the subordinate officers, admittedly un- 
fit for their positions and at the same time swayed by the 
passions of the period, chose usually to see only the freed- 
man's side in the adjustment of a dispute. Moreover, the 
widely circulated report, doubtless genuinely believed by 
some, that the whites were using every means to re-enslave 
the blacks, had its weight in making the bureau agents the 
special champions of the negroes regardless of the facts in 
the case. This was not true of those higher in authority, 
and probably, if the bureau could have secured judicious 
officials throughout, many of the benefits expected would 
have been realized. 



VITA. 

John Porter Mollis was born in Chester County, South 
Carolina, November 24, 1872. He attended the local schools 
of the community, and later the public schools of Rock Hill, 
South Carolina. In the fall of 1892 he entered Wofford 
College, from which institution he received the degree of 
A. B. in June, 1895. During the academic year, 1895-96, 
he was principal of a school at Jefferson, South Carolina. 
In September, 1896, he was appointed to a position in the 
high school department of the Rock Hill Public Schools, 
remaining there four years. He entered Johns Hopkins 
University in October, 1900, where he has pursued graduate 
studies in History, Political Economy and Political Science. 
He held a University Scholarship in 1902-3, and was 
Fellow in History in 1903-4. 



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